Plaintiff S183/2021 v Minister for Home Affairs

Immigration – Refugees – Application for protection visa – Where plaintiff invited to attend protection visa interview in Melbourne – Where delegate of Minister sent plaintiff letters under ss 56 and 57 of Migration Act 1958 (Cth) requesting further information and inviting plaintiff to comment on information – Where plaintiff lived in Sydney, suffered from mental health issues, was experiencing homelessness and was not fluent in English – Where plaintiff failed to attend interview and failed to respond substantively to letters – Where delegate offered to reschedule interview in Sydney – Where plaintiff did not understand interview offered in Sydney and did not attend – Where delegate exercised discretion under s 62 of Migration Act to refuse to grant visa without taking further action to obtain additional information from plaintiff – Where delegate found plaintiff's claims not credible for reasons including plaintiff's failure to attend interview and respond to letters – Whether delegate acted unreasonably in exercising discretion under s 62 – Whether delegate reasoned illogically, irrationally or unreasonably in rejecting plaintiff's claims – Whether delegate failed to comply with requirements of s 57 to give particulars of relevant information to plaintiff and to ensure as far as reasonably practicable that plaintiff understood why information was relevant – Whether delegate failed to comply with s 499(2A) of Migration Act by failing to take into account relevant country information as required by direction given under s 499(1).
Words and phrases – "adverse credibility findings", "country information", "credibility", "further information", "interview", "outcome and process", "relevant information", "s 56 letter", "s 57 letter", "unreasonableness".
Migration Act 1958 (Cth), ss 56, 57, 62, 65, 499.