Court name: Court of Appeal (Civil Division)
Date of decision:

This case, heard first before the First-tier Tribunal (Immigration and Asylum Chamber) (the “First-tier Tribunal”) followed by the Upper Tribunal (Immigration and Asylum Chamber) (the “Upper Tribunal”), concerned the Secretary of State for the Home Department’s decision under section 40(3) of the British Nationality Act 1981 (the “1981 Act”) to deprive the appellant of his British citizenship granted on 11 December 2007 on the ground that, in his application, the appellant had deliberately concealed the fact that he had earlier obtained a grant of British citizenship using false details. 

Before the Court of Appeal, the key issues to be determined were (i) on whom the burden of proof lay to prove that the appellant would be stateless if deprived of British citizenship, and (ii) whether the Upper Tribunal had correctly determined that the First-tier Tribunal’s failure to consider the issue of the appellant’s statelessness was immaterial.

Court name: Court of Appeal (Civil Division)
Date of decision:

The Secretary of State for the Home Department appealed a decision to overturn two orders depriving E3 and N3 of their British citizenship. The issue raised by the appeal was whether the Secretary of State was precluded by section 40(4) of the 1981 Act from making the orders, because they rendered E3 and N3 stateless. The focus of the Court of Appeal’s judgment was whether the burden of proof concerning whether E3 and N3 would be rendered stateless following deprivation of their British citizenship fell on the Secretary of State or E3 and N3.