Coming up in the High Court

Key Points:

Immigration remains the main source of much innovation in administrative law. The High Court has granted special leave to appeal in some interesting and challenging cases, including:

NAIS v MIMIA [2005]

HCATrans 36

The High Court granted special leave to the applicant on the issue of whether excessive delay in making a decision could, in itself, lead to jurisdictional error. The Full Federal Court held that theoretically this could constitute a jurisdictional error but not by itself. It held that the court will need to be satisfied that the delay in question resulted in the real probability or likelihood of prejudice. In some (rare) cases the delay might be so inordinate as to itself give rise to an inference of prejudice. It further held that the delay did not have that effect in this particular case.

Ruddock v Taylor [2004]

HCATrans 390

The High Court has heard the Minister’s appeal against the decision by the NSW Court of Appeal. That decision affirmed the liability of the Minister to pay damages to Mr Taylor for false imprisonment resulting from the cancellation of his visa, in circum-stances where the cancellation decision was subsequently quashed by a writ of certiorari.

WAEV v MIMIA [2004]

HCATrans 455

Under section 425 of the Migration Act, the Refugee Review Tribunal is obliged to invite an applicant to appear before it to give evidence and present arguments relating to the issues arising in relation to the decision under review. The question in this case is whether by denying the applicant’s migration agent an opportunity to make final oral submissions, the Tribunal contravened section 425.

WAAG v MIMIA [2004]

HCATrans 475

The High Court has granted special leave to appeal in this matter, which is about whether there was a constructive failure to exercise jurisdiction. The applicant here claimed to be a homosexual subject to persecution in his homeland. He argued that the Refugee Review Tribunal’s questions to test that claim showed the Tribunal failed to perceive the task that it was meant to be engaged in.

Applicant VEAL of 2002 v MIMIA

[2005] HCATrans 47

The Full Federal Court held that the RRT had not failed to accord procedural fairness to the applicant by a failure to disclose to the applicant information contained within a ‘dob-in’ letter which was not relied on in the decision.