[2025] UKUT 181 (AAC)

For CICA Mr Moretto submitted that the Tribunal made no error of law and that

the 2012 Scheme allows a discretion to extend time to permit a late claim only where “due to exceptional circumstances the Applicant could not have applied earlier” (paragraph 89(a)

in this case, the Applicant knew about the Scheme by August 2016 when he applied for compensation for a different assault

he argued before the Tribunal that he did not apply for compensation for the domestic abuse he suffered from about December 2014 to April/May 2016 because he did not know that that was a crime. The Tribunal plainly permissibly rejected that evidence, given that he went to Victim Support and made a report to police about it in around August 2016

the Tribunal did not therefore err in finding that there were not exceptional circumstances which meant that he could not have applied earlier: he knew (contrary to his case) that the domestic abuse was a crime and he knew that there was a scheme which provided compensation to victims of crime

in any event, having rejected the reason which he gave for not making a claim sooner (that he did not know it was a crime), the Tribunal could not then have properly gone on to find that there were exceptional circumstances preventing him from applying sooner

nor did the Tribunal make an error of law in finding that “the evidence presented in support of the application mean[t] that it could not be determined without further extensive enquiries by a claims officer” (paragraph 89(b)). Hence, time could not be extended for that reason either and the claim for judicial review must be refused on that ground alone.