[2025] UKUT 029 (AAC)

In this particular jurisdiction, the considerations are somewhat different to those in the authorities we have mentioned, because this is an appeal in relation to the appellant’s inclusion on the barred lists, the statutory scheme for which provides for the identity of those on the lists to be kept confidential and only revealed by DBS to those with a legitimate interest in knowing. Generally, that just means prospective employers, as the Divisional Court (Flaux LJ and Lewis J) explained in R (SXM) v DBS [2020] EWHC 624 (Admin), [2020] 1 WLR 3259. However, that case was a judicial review brought by someone who claimed to be the victim of sexual abuse who wanted to be informed by DBS whether the alleged perpetrator had been included on the barred list. The Divisional Court held that DBS had acted lawfully in refusing to disclose that information. It is, of course, not possible to tell from the judgment in SXM whether the alleged perpetrator had appealed to the Upper Tribunal or not, since that fact would itself have conveyed to the claimant in that case that the alleged perpetrator had been included on the barred list. It is, though, relevant for us to take into account that not anonymising an appellant in an appeal to the Upper Tribunal goes ‘against the grain’ of the legislative scheme as it was recognised to be by the Divisional Court in SXM.