In a judgment handed down today (21 July 2023) in R (SXK, K, NY and AM) v SSHD [2023] EWHC 1876 (Admin), Swift J has allowed the claims of four asylum seekers challenging widespread failures in the operation of the asylum support system and significant breaches of duty in their own cases.
Swift J held in summary:
- Applications for section 95 support must be determined promptly, ordinarily within no longer than ten days from an applicant’s first contact with Migrant Help [37]
- The SSHD’s “Approach” whereby a person who made a section 95 application was already in private accommodation, even if the application was granted no steps would be taken to move the applicant into accommodation provided by the Home Secretary unless the applicant “made a further request for urgent accommodation” was inconsistent with her statutory obligations under the scheme for section 95 IAA 1999 support [51].
- The SSHD’s “Practice” whereby even after a favourable decision on a section 95 application had been made, the Home Secretary did not provide support for essential living needs until such time as the applicant was moved into dispersal accommodation was also inconsistent with the SSHD’s duties under the scheme for section 95 IAA 1999 support [51].
- The Secretary of State’s failure to operate the system so as to make section 98 asylum support payments to people in private accommodation during lengthy periods while section 95 applications were being processed was also unlawful [44].
- The failure to make support payments to K in the eight-month period she was waiting for a section 95 decision and to NY in the two-month period he was waiting for a decision were unlawful [40-44].
- The failure to make section 95 payments to NY in the 10-month period after he was granted section 95 support was unlawful [48-50]
- Swift J also held in the linked cases of HA and SXK that HA and SXK regulation 10A of the Asylum Support Regulations 2000 requires a cash payment and the obligation to provide additional support for children and pregnant women cannot be met by provision in kind [18].
A copy of the judgment can be found here.
This decision has been commented on in the Guardian.
Alex Goodman KC and Natasha Jackson acted for the successful Claimants' K, NY and AM, instructed by John Crowley at Leigh Day.
