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Public Law Solicitors
High Court grants permission to challenge concerning access to legal aid for immigration detainees held in prison (7 July 2020)
Date: 07/07/2020
The High Court has granted our client permission to seek judicial review of the failure to secure his access to publicly funded legal representation while he was detained under immigration powers in prison in the case of R (SM) v the Lord Chancellor.
SM was detained under immigration powers in a prison for over nine months without access to a legal aid immigration adviser. As a result he was unable to challenge the lawfulness of his detention, and suffered severe detriment in relation to his immigration case.
Immigration detainees held in Immigration Removal Centres (IRCs) have access to the Detained Duty Advice Service (DDAS). The DDAS ensures that legal aid lawyers visit each IRC on a regular basis to provide legal advice and representation. SM, like all detainees in IRCs was held by the Home Office under immigration powers. The fact that he was held in prison meant that he could not benefit from the DDAS, or from the more favourable arrangements in place for providers of legal aid representing clients in IRCs. As a result, he found it impossible to find a legal representative and was forced to represent himself in his asylum claim, further submissions, a bail hearing, and an appeal to the refusal of his further submissions.
SM’s case is that the Lord Chancellor, who is responsible for securing people’s access to legal aid, has unlawfully discriminated against SM, and in doing so, he has breached SM’s rights under Article 14 of the European Convention on Human Rights, taken with Articles 2, 3, 5, 8 and 6 of the Convention. In his grant of permission, Mr Justice Linden held that the case was reasonably arguable and that it raises an important issue.
At any given time, there are around 400 immigration detainees held in prisons, so this litigation may result in improved access to justice for a large and particularly vulnerable group of people, enabling them to properly challenge the lawfulness of their detention, and to properly advance their asylum and human rights claims.
SM is represented by Toufique Hossain, Jeremy Bloom and Jonah Mendelsohn at Duncan Lewis Solicitors, and counsel Chris Buttler of Matrix Chambers and Ali Bandegani of Garden Court Chambers.