Ground 2
16. Here it was argued on behalf of the applicant that the refusal decision failed to address a relevant issue altogether and was therefore flawed. The second letter of the administrative refusal dealt with the kidnap only on the basis that the applicant had failed to supply “direct proof”. On the applicant’s behalf it was argued that this was wrong in that she had supplied direct proof both in the form of her own evidence and by providing a police report concerning the incident. The fact that the report did no more than record the reporting of the incident did not detract from the fact that it amounted to direct proof. In addition the evidence provided had been done in precisely the form required by the current guidance which required that evidence must be provided in the form of a letter setting out full details of the compelling reason for the absence and supporting documents. It was appropriate to require no more than evidence which should be or was capable of being believed. In the alternative the respondent should have given the applicant the opportunity to provide additional documents insofar as the original ones were considered to be inadequate, in line with the evidential flexibility policy that had been extant at the time.