The UK High Court has reportedly found the Secretary of State for the Home Office guilty of operating an unlawful ‘secret policy’. As a result of this policy, over 1,500 modern slavery victims were denied their right of leave to remain. The claimant, referred to as XY in the lawsuit, was abducted and enslaved by a gang in his home country, Albania. Despite being identified and supported as a victim of modern slavery by the Single Competent Authority (SCA) in 2021, the controversial policy impeded his asylum claim, prolonging his psychological recovery and worsening his mental ill health.
The victims of modern slavery are entitled to leave to remain as specified under the “Discretionary Leave Considerations for Victims of Modern Slavery” policy. This is anchored on article 14(1) (a) of the Council of Europe Convention on Action against Trafficking in Human Beings 2005 (ECAT). This key principle of ECAT requires its member states to issue renewable residence permits to victims of modern slavery whose continued stay is considered essential due to their personal circumstances.
The High Court judgment establishes that the discretional leave is considered under the policy when the Competent Authority has conclusively made a positive declaration that an individual is indeed a victim of modern slavery and fulfills one of several criteria. Nonetheless, the application of Article 14 remains under the jurisdiction of the secretary of state because the ECAT has not been incorporated into the national law.
This ruling follows the groundbreaking decision in R ( KTT) v the Secretary of State for the Home Department, which affirmed that confirmed victims with ongoing asylum claims based on re-trafficking risk were eligible for modern slavery leave under the Home Office’s published policy.
The court in the present case observed that the hidden nature of the “secret policy” not only stripped it off its coherence but also supported the claimant’s argument that leave to remain was intentionally offered in these circumstances to keep the policy under wraps. Hence, the court concluded that the government had violated its duty of candor by withholding information from victims awaiting the determination of their asylum claims.
In conclusion, the court found that the government had breached Article 8 of the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR), which was due to its interference with the claimant’s right to leave and the failure to serve decisions, violating his procedural rights. The government also violated Article 14 of the ECHR, as he was not treated as a confirmed victim of modern slavery.
For additional details and the full ruling of the court, you can refer to the original article published by JURIST – News.