[2025] UKUT 009 (AAC)

JB applied for permission to appeal the FtT Decision, which was refused by the First-tier Tribunal. JB then applied to the Upper Tribunal for permission to appeal, but permission was refused by Judge Jacobs.

JB applied to the Upper Tribunal for Judge Jacobs’s refusal of permission to be set aside under rule 43 of the Tribunal Procedure (Upper Tribunal) Rules 2008. This was because he had sent recordings that he had made of conversations he had had with his then responsible clinician immediately following the hearing before the Tribunal which he said showed that the evidence that Dr Al Noufoury had given at the hearing had been misleading. Judge Jacobs set aside his refusal of permission in the interests of justice and the matter of permission was referred to me to consider.

The Appellant’s representative provided detailed submissions identifying potential errors of law made by the First-tier Tribunal, including in its decision-making on the issue of whether JB suffered from paranoid persecutory delusions (it decided that he did, and this was an important plank of its decision that the statutory conditions to continued detention were met), and in the adequacy of the First-tier Tribunal’s reasons in that regard.

I gave permission to appeal on the basis that it was at least arguable that the audio recordings submitted by JB in connection with his application to set aside Judge Jacobs’s refusal of permission show that the Tribunal was misled as to the availability of psychological treatment at The Spinney, resulting in the Tribunal deciding the application based on a material mistake of fact. I did not restrict my grant of permission.