The Court of Appeal's judgment on TOEIC and APPG report

The Court of Appeal (Lord Justice Underhill, Lady Justice Elizabeth Laing and Sir Nigel Davis) has handed down its judgment in Alam v Secretary of State for the Home Department [2021] EWCA 1538.

The appellant, Mr Alam, was issued with a removal decision on the basis that he had obtained his TOEIC English language test certificate by deception. He challenged that decision by way of Judicial Review. Mr Justice Dove, after a fact-finding hearing, where the appellant gave oral evidence and was cross-examined, found that he had used a proxy for his test.

By this appeal to the Court of Appeal, the appellant challenged Mr Justice Dove's decision on two grounds. First, the delay between the date of the hearing and promulgation of Mr Justice Dove's decision meant that his findings of fact were unsafe. Second, Mr Justice Dove did not attach proper weight to the APPG report in making its decision.

The Court of Appeal found that the findings made by Mr Justice Dove were not unsafe on the ground of delay because he had in fact drafted his decision shortly after the hearing. The Court of Appeal also held that the submissions and evidence before Mr Justice Dove, which included the APPG report, did not require him to wholly disregard the evidence adduced by the Secretary of State based on ETS data.

The Court of Appeal accordingly dismissed the appellant's appeal but noted that its reasoning were very fact-specific.

The Court of Appeal's judgment is available here.

Zane Malik QC appeared for the respondent, the Secretary of State for the Home Department.