Introduction:
1. I am the seventh judge to consider this claim for judicial review of the refusal of the respondent on 21 August 2015 (upheld on administrative review on 17 September 2015) of the applicant’s application for leave to remain as the unmarried partner of a Tier 2 Migrant. The delays that have beset this case occurred because permission to apply for judicial review was at first refused at an oral hearing but was eventually granted by the Court of Appeal over two years later. 2. The Court of Appeal referred the case back to this tribunal for the substantive hearing, which took place before me in Leeds on 10 October 2018. The parties agreed that the applicant’s application for leave to remain was considered on a basis that was unsatisfactory in two respects. First, the applicant was unaware that she would be regarded as an overstayer, because a decision of this tribunal did not reach her. Second, documents sent to the respondent, on which she relied, were not considered by the respondent. 3. The question for me is whether those two points, or either of them, make the respondent’s decision unlawful, as contended by the applicant who represented herself with eloquence and courtesy; or whether, as contended by the respondent ably represented by Mr Thomann of counsel, those shortcomings in the decision making process did not result in any unfairness to the applicant and do not make the decision challenged unlawful.