Shyti v Secretary of State For The Home Department

4 July 2023

[2023] EWCA Civ 770

Court of Appeal

A man lied about being from Kosovo to get British citizenship. A lower court only looked at one lie, but the higher court said all his lies mattered, so he lost his citizenship.

Key Facts

•The appellant (A), an Albanian citizen, obtained British citizenship through fraud by falsely claiming to be Kosovan in multiple applications to the Home Office.
•A's fraudulent claim was used in his asylum application, applications under the Legacy Programme, an application for a travel document, and his application for naturalisation.
•A admitted to lying in his applications but argued that his false nationality was not material to the grant of citizenship.
•The Secretary of State argued that the false claim was material because it was directly related to the grant of indefinite leave to remain (ILR) and subsequently, citizenship.
•The First-tier Tribunal (F-tT) allowed A's appeal, finding that the deception had only an indirect bearing on the grant of citizenship.
•The Upper Tribunal (UT) allowed the Secretary of State's appeal, holding that the F-tT erred in law by failing to consider the full reasoning in the decision letter.

Legal Principles

Deprivation of citizenship is permissible under section 40(3) of the British Nationality Act 1981 if naturalisation was obtained by fraud, false representation, or concealment of a material fact.

British Nationality Act 1981, section 40(3)

In deprivation of citizenship appeals, the First-tier Tribunal (F-tT) applies judicial review principles to assess whether the Secretary of State's decision was lawful.

Ciceri [2021] UKUT 00238 (IAC), Begum [2021] UKSC 7

For fraud to be material, it must have a direct bearing on the decision to grant citizenship; indirect bearing is insufficient.

Sleiman [2017] UKUT 00367 (IAC)

The Secretary of State must consider an applicant's good character when granting citizenship, and deception in dealings with the government can negatively impact this assessment.

Nationality Instructions, Annex D to Chapter 18

Outcomes

The Court of Appeal dismissed A's appeal.

The F-tT erred in law by failing to consider the Secretary of State's full reasoning in the decision letter, which included multiple independent grounds for deprivation of citizenship. The Court of Appeal declined to address the question of whether the Begum decision altered the legal approach to such appeals, as it would be obiter.

Shyti v Secretary of State For The Home Department

Key Facts

Legal Principles

Outcomes

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