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L.M. v International Protection Office and Anor (Approved)
Factual and Procedural Background
The Applicant, a 48-year-old Malawian national, arrived in the State in 2012 on a student visa. Her final permission expired in September 2017, after which she remained without lawful permission for approximately four years. [1][2]
She applied for international protection in September 2021, alleging an arranged marriage and extensive domestic violence. The application was refused by the International Protection Office, and the International Protection Appeals Tribunal later upheld the refusal, accepting that she had experienced domestic violence but finding that state protection was available in Malawi. [3][4][5]
The Applicant sought a review of the refusal of permission to remain. The Second Respondent refused permission on 8 April 2025, and the Applicant commenced judicial review proceedings on 7 May 2025. [6][7][8]
Legal Issues Presented
- Whether the challenged decision contained a significant error concerning the Applicant’s current employment. [9][10][11]
- Whether the decision-maker adequately considered all relevant humanitarian, private-life, employment, integration and medical factors under section 49 of the International Protection Act 2015. [9][12][13]
- Whether the decision gave adequate reasons and sufficiently engaged with the Applicant’s submissions and supporting documentation. [9][14][15]
Arguments of the Parties
Applicant’s Arguments
- The decision wrongly suggested that there was no evidence of the Applicant’s continuing employment as a home care assistant, despite submissions stating that she worked in that role and an extant labour-market permission. [10][16][17][11]
- The decision failed adequately to consider her 13 years in the State, employment, training, church activities, friendships, integration and humanitarian circumstances when conducting the required proportionality assessment. [14][15]
- The decision failed to provide adequate reasons and did not sufficiently engage with the documentation and submissions supporting the application. [15][18]
Respondents’ Arguments
- The decision was detailed, correctly applied the law and adequately addressed the facts and submissions. [19]
- The Applicant had no right to remain following the refusal of international protection, and the PTR application concerned only the exercise of the Minister’s discretion. [20][21]
- The decision-maker had considered the Applicant’s documents, medical evidence, country-of-origin information, integration and references. [22]
- The statement concerning current employment was factually correct because no new documents confirmed employment at the time of review. [23][24]
- The decision properly balanced the Applicant’s rights against the State’s interest in enforcing immigration controls, and the Minister’s discretion was broad. [25][26][27]
Table of Precedents Cited
| Precedent | Rule or Principle Cited For | Application by the Court |
|---|---|---|
| MK (Albania) v Minister for Justice & Equality [2024] 2 IR 113 | Applicants with precarious residence generally require “something more” than residence alone to outweigh the State’s immigration interests. [28][29][30] | The Court accepted the broad discretion principle but held that the decision-maker still had to engage properly with the Applicant’s particular facts. [31][32] |
| DE (An infant) v Minister for Justice [2018] 3 IR 326 | Humanitarian leave involves a broad discretion distinct from legal entitlement, requiring consideration of relevant humanitarian matters. [33][34][35][36][37] | The case supported the conclusion that relevant medical, integration and humanitarian matters must be considered, even where no legal right to remain exists. [38][37] |
| MK v Minister for Justice | Only exceptional circumstances and something more than the ordinary disruption of removal will generally cause Article 8 interests to prevail over the State’s immigration interests. [29][30] | The Court contrasted the shorter residence in that case with the Applicant’s 13-year presence in the State. [39] |
| A (Albania) v Minister for Justice & Equality [2023] IEHC 692 | Section 49 assessment extends beyond determining whether Articles 3 and 8 of the ECHR have been breached. [40][41] | The Court treated the statutory assessment as requiring consideration of wider private, family and humanitarian circumstances. [41][42] |
| H.K. (Western Sahara) v Minister for Justice & Equality [2022] IECA 141 | Section 49 requires consideration of more than ECHR rights alone and reaches all aspects of private and family life. [40][41][42] | The Court relied on the principle in finding that the Applicant’s long residence, work and social connections required careful analysis. [43][44][45] |
| SM v Minister for Justice [2025] IEHC 629 | Applicants are entitled to make humanitarian representations and to have them considered; reasons must enable the recipient to understand how the arguments were addressed. [42][46][47][48] | The Court applied the requirement of genuine engagement with relevant facts and cogent reasoning. [32][49][50] |
| M v Minister for Justice, Home Affairs and Migration [2025] IEHC 761 | A decision-maker may consider employment, upskilling, volunteering and healthcare-worker shortages when assessing the common good and whether “something more” exists. [51][52][53] | The Court found no evidence that the Applicant’s contribution as a home care assistant or the value of her employment had been considered. [54][45][55] |
Court’s Reasoning and Analysis
The proceedings concerned judicial review, not an appeal on the merits. The Court therefore assessed the lawfulness of the decision rather than deciding whether the Applicant should receive PTR. [56]
The Minister had a wide discretion under section 49. Ordinarily, the State’s interest in controlling immigration would prevail where residence was precarious, unless the Applicant demonstrated “something more”. However, the decision-maker was required to engage substantively with the facts, which had to be apparent from the quality of the reasons. [31][32]
The Court found that the repeated statement that no recent submissions showed current employment conveyed an implicit finding that the Applicant had not established continuing employment. That finding failed to address her present-tense submission that she worked as a home care assistant and her extant labour-market permission. [57][58][59][60]
The alleged ambiguity in an employer reference did not justify the decision. The reference was undated and did not state when employment ended, and another reference indicated that the Applicant was working for the employer in March 2023. The Respondents’ alternative explanation was also not the reason given by the decision-maker. [61]
Because the employment point was fundamental and had been repeated three times, the Court held that it constituted a serious error rather than a minor discrepancy. [62][63]
The Court also found that the assessment inadequately addressed the Applicant’s 13 years in the State, nine of which involved precarious permissions, together with her employment, training, community participation and social connections. Compared with the shorter residence periods considered in the cited cases, the Applicant’s residence required careful proportionality analysis. [64][65][39][66][43][44]
In addition, the decision did not demonstrate consideration of the Applicant’s contribution as a home care assistant, including its potential relevance to the common good in a sector involving a shortage of skilled workers. [54][45]
Finally, the decision did not sufficiently analyse the impact of removal on the Applicant’s social relationships and ties with clients and their families. This reflected a broader failure to engage with the particular facts and supporting material. [49][67][50]
Holding and Implications
Certiorari granted. The Court held that the decision of the Second Respondent dated 8 April 2025 had to be quashed because of the serious employment-related error and the inadequate engagement with residence, employment, integration and humanitarian circumstances. [63][55][68]
The Court proposed granting the reliefs sought in paragraphs 1, 2 and 3 of the Applicant’s notice of motion, with further submissions invited on ancillary orders, costs and the final form of order. [69][70][71][72][73]
The direct effect was to set aside the challenged PTR review decision. The opinion does not state broader implications or establish a new precedent.
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