[Home] [Databases] [World Law] [Multidatabase Search] [Help] [Feedback]
	England and Wales High Court (Administrative Court) Decisions
You are here: BAILII >> Databases >> England and Wales High Court (Administrative Court) Decisions >> Qaza, R (on the application of) v Secretary of State for the Home Department [2014] EWHC 2851 (Admin) (20 August 2014) URL: http://www.bailii.org/ew/cases/EWHC/Admin/2014/2851.html Cite as: [2014] EWHC 2851 (Admin)

[New search] [Printable RTF version] [Help]

IN THE HIGH COURT OF JUSTICE
QUEEN'S BENCH DIVISION
ADMINISTRATIVE COURT

		Royal Courts of Justice Strand, London, WC2A 2LL
		20 August 2014

Mr Timothy Brennan QC :

Overview

1. In this claim for judicial review the Claimant seeks a declaration that he was unlawfully detained by the Defendant, the Secretary of State, from 16 July 2012 until his release on bail on 24 June 2013, a period of 343 days. He also puts forward arguments in respect of detention for parts of that period. The Secretary of State was detaining the Claimant pending removal from the United Kingdom, as permitted and, latterly, mandated in respect of a foreign criminal by the UK Borders Act 2007, s 36(1) and s 36(2). It is the Claimant's case, in reliance on the principles initially derived from the judgment of Woolf J in R v Governor of Durham Prison ex parte Hardial Singh [1984] 1 WLR 704, that during the relevant period the Defendant was not acting lawfully in detaining him because (in short) there was no prospect that the Claimant would in fact be deported within a reasonable period.

Narrative

2. The Claimant arrived in the UK by clandestine means. When arrested on 3 November 2010 he said he was from Albania. He said he was just 15 years old which, if true, would have entitled him to automatic grant of limited leave to remain, to local authority accommodation and to other advantages. After he had spent a night in hospital (otherwise immaterial) an age assessment of the Claimant was carried out by officers of Buckinghamshire Social Services who concluded that he was over 18 years old. He was immediately served with illegal entrant papers and applied for asylum, now claiming through an interpreter during his screening interview on 4 November 2010 that he was a Kurd from Iran, and not from Albania.
3. He was released on temporary admission to the UK on 5 November 2010.
4. The asylum claim was initially refused by letter of 1 December 2010; the Claimant's alleged Iranian nationality was not accepted nor was his claimed age. A number of features of his story gave rise to doubts as to his origins, including the following. He was unable to describe the Iranian flag, or coinage, nor could he answer questions about the Iranian national anthem. The location of his claimed home village of Tete (or Teta), and a nearby village of Maz Nawa, each said to be some hours from Sardasht, could not be identified by investigators. He could not describe local places, or routes to get to them. The dates he provided were not consistent with the Iranian calendar. His claim that he feared persecution in Iran because of his delivery of political leaflets at the behest of his father was not accepted. For example, he claimed that a police raid on his family home was in part responsible for that fear of persecution; on his account, the raid post-dated his departure from Iran so he would not have known of it.
5. The Claimant appealed to the First-tier Tribunal against the refusal of his asylum claim, under s 82(1) of the Nationality, Immigration and Asylum Act 2002. His appeal was isHisuccessful to the extent that on 23 June 2011 his case was remitted for consideration of factors then set out in paragraph 395C of the Immigration Rules (HC 395), in the light of what was held to be a policy of the Defendant to consider those factors even in the case of an illegal entrant.
6. Throughout this period the Claimant was at liberty, though he failed to report as required on occasions in June, August, October and November 2011. The period of liberty came to an end on 16 November 2011 when he was arrested on suspicion of arson and remanded in custody.
7. In a separate development, on 30 November 2011 the Iranian Embassy in London was closed, and there was thereafter no readily available diplomatic channel available to obtain emergency travel documents (ETDs) for the Claimant's return to Iran, should Iran be regarded as the appropriate destination in due course.
8. On 8 March 2012 the Claimant was convicted in the Crown Court of an offence of arson and was sentenced to 16 months imprisonment. Promptly thereafter, on 1 April 2012, while he was serving that prison sentence, he was served with notice of liability to automatic deportation. Such a notice foreshadows the requirement of the UK Borders Act 2007, s 32(5) whereby the Secretary of State must, subject to certain exceptions, make a deportation order in respect of a "foreign criminal". The term "foreign criminal" is defined in part by reference to a period of imprisonment of at least 12 months and applied to the Claimant.
9. The Claimant's immigration detention challenged in this claim commenced on 16 July 2012, the date, halfway through his sentence after allowance for the period on remand, on which he was entitled to release on licence from prison. He was detained under the UK Borders Act 2007 s 36 (detention) pending the making of a deportation order against him under s 32(5). The power of detention pending the making of the deportation order is discretionary (see s 36(1)(b)).
10. I deal separately below with the events and decisions during his detention, which are said by the Claimant to render that detention unlawful.
11. Following reconsideration of the asylum claim, which was again refused, and a refusal by the First-tier Tribunal on 4 October 2012 to grant bail to the Claimant, on 15 November 2012 the Defendant signed a deportation order against the Claimant under s 32(5) and on 16 November 2012 notified him of it. The consequence of that deportation order was (see s 36(2)) that the Defendant was required to exercise the power of detention under paragraph 2(3) of Schedule 3 to the Immigration Act 1971 (detention pending removal) unless in the circumstances the Defendant thought it inappropriate.
12. Accordingly, from 16 November 2011 until 16 July 2012 (when he would otherwise have been released) the Claimant was remanded in custody pursuant to contemplated or actual criminal proceedings or was imprisoned pursuant to the sentence of the Crown Court. No issue arises in these proceedings as to the lawfulness of that period of detention.
13. From 16 July 2012 until 15 November 2012 (date of deportation order) the Claimant was detained under discretionary powers found in the UK Borders Act 2007 s 36(1)(b) ("pending the making of the deportation order") and, once that order was made and until he was released on bail on 24 June 2013, he was detained under paragraph 2(3) of Schedule 3 to the Immigration Act 1971; this latter detention was required by the UK Borders Act 2007 s 36(2) "unless in the circumstances the Secretary of State thinks it inappropriate".
14. There were other proceedings during the Claimant's detention. He applied for judicial review, challenging the age assessment of 4 November 2010, and on 21 December 2012 Walker J ordered that the Claimant be granted bail if Hillingdon Social Services could safely accommodate him. They could not do so, and he remained in detention. In the event, Hillingdon Social Services assessed the Claimant to be aged over 20 and the progress of those judicial review proceedings is not now material, other than as a part of the background.
15. The First-tier Tribunal refused bail on two occasions, in April and May 2013.
16. The present proceedings were issued on 24 June 2013 and the Claimant was granted bail by the First-tier Tribunal on that day.
17. Litigation concerning the Claimant's immigration status continued since his release. Most recently, in April 2014 the First-tier Tribunal heard, and thereafter dismissed, the Claimant's appeal against the Defendant's refusal to revoke the deportation order on, inter alia, asylum grounds. In a written decision of 30 April 2014 the First-tier Tribunal found as a fact that the Claimant had been an adult at the time that he originally entered the UK, a decision made easier by a belated admission from the Claimant that he had been born in 1992, some three years earlier than he had previously said. The Tribunal was not satisfied that the Claimant was a national of Iran and, without making an express finding in respect thereof, said that it believed that he was a national of Iraq.

Principles

18. In R (Lumba v Secretary of State for the Home Department) [2011] UKSC 12, [2012] 1 AC 245 the majority of the Supreme Court, approving observations to be found in R v Governor of Durham ex parte Hardial Singh [1984] 1 WLR 704 and in R (I) v Secretary of State for the Home Department [2002] EWCA Civ 888, [2003] INLR 196, encapsulated the relevant principles concerning detention for the purposes of deportation as follows: (i) the Secretary of State must intend to deport the person and can only use the power to detain for that purpose; (ii) the deportee may only be detained for a period which is reasonable in all the circumstances; (iii) if, before the expiry of the reasonable period, it becomes apparent that the Secretary of State will not be able to effect deportation within a reasonable period, he should not seek to exercise the power of detention; (iv) the Secretary of State should act with reasonable diligence and expedition to effect removal.
19. The Hardial Singh principles, as they have come to be called, are not the equivalent of statutory rules, breach of which is enough to found a claim for damages. They are applications of two legal propositions. First, that compulsory detention must be properly justified, and, secondly, that statutory powers must be used for the purposes for which they are given. To found a claim for damages for wrongful detention, it is not enough that, in retrospect, some part of the statutory process is shown to have taken longer than it should have done. There is a dividing-line between mere administrative failing and unreasonableness amounting to illegality. Even if that line has been crossed, it is necessary for the claimant to show a specific period during which, but for the failure, he would not longer have been detained. Authority for this is to be found in R (Krasniqi) v Secretary of State for the Home Department [2011] EWCA Civ 1549, at [12] (Carnwath LJ).
20. As was recorded by the Court of Appeal in R(A) v Secretary of State for the Home Department [2007] EWCA Civ 804 (see para [62], Toulson LJ), it is for the court, and not for the Secretary of State, to determine the legal boundaries of administrative detention, apart possibly from incidental questions of fact which the court may recognise that the Secretary of State is better placed to decide than itself. In my judgment this proposition applies in a case where detention under paragraph 2(3) of Schedule 3 to the Immigration Act 1971 is mandated by s 36(2) of the UK Borders Act 2007 (unless the Secretary of State considers it inappropriate) just as where it is not so mandated. The liberty of the individual is in issue: the court must ask whether the decision of the Secretary of State to maintain detention was justified; the question is not whether the decision was irrational. Further, the statutory regime under s 36(2) could not, at any stage, justify detention of the Claimant for more than a reasonable time, nor when there was no prospect of deportation within a reasonable time. Even when mandated by s 36(2) to exercise it, the Secretary of State was still exercising the power under paragraph 2(3) of Schedule 3 to the Immigration Act 1971 and was still subject to the controls on that power discussed above, see R (Francis) v Secretary of State for the Home Department [2014] EWCA Civ 718, [47] (Moore-Bick LJ), [57], [68] (Sir Stephen Sedley).
21. Any risk that the person may abscond is of paramount importance (see the remark of Lord Dyson JSC in Lumba at [121]). So is any risk that he may reoffend. In my judgment the risk that the subject may reoffend is a factor of particular weight in the case of a "foreign criminal" in respect of whom, as in the present case, the Secretary of State is mandated to exercise the power of detention.

The detention period

22. It is the Claimant's case that his detention from 16 July 2012 was unlawful as the Defendant intended to remove him to his claimed origin of Iran but was not able to do so as the Iranian Embassy in London was closed and so no application for emergency travel documents could be submitted. Alternatively, he says, his detention from 16 May 2013 was unlawful as on that date the Defendant determined that the Claimant was from Iraq, but that there was no reasonable prospect of his removal to Iraq within a reasonable period of time. In the further alternative, he says that a period of detention from 21 July 2013 until his release on bail three days later was unlawful because the Defendant failed to take adequate account of medical evidence obtained and provided on behalf of the Claimant and should have either transferred him to hospital (against his will) or tried harder to persuade him to go.
23. It is not suggested that the Claimant was detained for any purpose other than to effect his deportation. In those circumstances, having regard to the principles already outlined, it is necessary to look at what happened over the 343 days of the Claimant's detention and to consider whether the Claimant was detained for longer than a period which is reasonable in all the circumstances, whether it was apparent that the Secretary of State would not be able to effect deportation within a reasonable period, and whether the Secretary of State failed to act with reasonable diligence and expedition to effect removal.
24. The initial decision to detain the claimant under immigration powers pre-dated expiry of the custodial portion of his prison sentence. On the basis of a report dated 3 July 2012 from an officer of the Criminal Casework Directorate authority was given by his superior for detention under s 36(1) (the last page of this document, which doubtless bore the superior's signature and the date of his decision, was not available in the court papers). The Claimant's criminal conviction was recorded, here and subsequently, as relating to an offence of "committing arson recklessly". This appears to have been a misdescription. The records show that the Claimant, faced with a proposal to transfer him to different accommodation, had threatened to set fire to the multi-occupancy hostel in which he was staying. Upset by the response, he tried to carry out the threat by setting fire to the mattress in his room. The arson was pre-meditated and deliberate, rather than reckless; the recorded recklessness presumably related to the attendant endangerment of life (see the Criminal Damage Act 1971, s 1(2)(b), (3)), as did the severity of the sentence. This incident of arson did not stand alone. There had been previous threats, in other circumstances, both to use arson as a means of coercion and of a less specific kind.
25. The core recorded reasons for detention on completion of the custodial portion of the sentence were the risk of harm to the public and the risk of absconding, which were then regarded as outweighing the presumption of liberty.
26. Thereafter, the Claimant's position was subject to "detention reviews". By 18 August 2012 the National Offender Management Service (NOMS) had assessed the risk of further serious harm being committed by the Claimant as "high". The Claimant was threatening self-harm. The recommendation, and decision, was to maintain detention pending consideration of the Claimant's liability for deportation. Advice was sought as to the necessary steps which needed to be taken to establish his true nationality. It was known that ETDs to Iran were not currently available, because of the closure of the Iranian Embassy. But the Claimant's nationality had not been accepted to be Iranian.
27. By 10 September 2012 the Claimant was assessed as evincing a high risk of absconding; he had a history of not complying with contact management restrictions and was at risk of deportation. The risk of serious harm remained high. Detention was further authorised. The interpreter dealing with the Claimant had expressed the view that he was not Iranian: his name was not Iranian; he knew little about Iran; he had a distinctive accent which suggested that he was from Erbil, Iraq. The officer giving authority to detain (based on clear risk of harm) recorded both that the extant decision on deportation should be resolved prior to the next review, and that the nationality issues should be addressed by CSIT (the country specialist investigation team). The proposal for reference to CSIT is a theme which appears on several occasions throughout the documents.
28. The deportation issue was not resolved by the date of the next review, which was 8 October 2012. It is unclear what, if anything, had been done in the meantime. Bail had been refused by the First-tier Tribunal just four days earlier. Detention was again authorised; again the risk of harm to the public and the risk of absconding currently outweighed the presumption of liberty. The report on which the decision was based recorded that deportation, if to Iran, would be contingent on resumption of ETD applications via the Iranian Embassy. If deportation was to be to Iraq, it could be done with the Claimant's agreement.
29. By 5 November 2012 the decision had been taken to make a deportation order against the Claimant, though the order had not then been made. Detention was further authorised based on risk of harm and risk of absconding. It was again recognised that the Claimant could voluntarily return to Iraq; the Iraqi Embassy would issue documentation to those returning voluntarily even in the absence of Iraqi passports. Discussions as to documentation for those returned involuntarily were continuing.
30. The deportation order was signed on 15 November 2012 and served on 16 November 2012. Further representations were received from the Claimant's solicitors on 22 November 2012, concerning the Claimant's ambition to integrate himself into UK society. A photocopy of a birth certificate was provided. The position was unchanged with regard both to Iran and to Iraq. The review decision on 3 December 2012 to continue detention reflected previous decisions. Indeed it used much the same words as previously: the risk of harm to the public and the risk of absconding outweighed the presumption of liberty. The approach appears to have overlooked (in favour of the Claimant) the change in the relevant statutory question consequent on the making of a deportation order in respect of a foreign criminal. The Defendant was now obliged to exercise the power of detention under paragraph 2(3) of Schedule 3 to the Immigration Act 1971 (detention pending removal) unless in the circumstances the Defendant thought it inappropriate. Inappropriateness could, of course, still be found in unreasonable length of detention, or in lack of reasonable prospect of deportation within a reasonable time. That said, a "presumption of liberty" was not the correct approach; the position was rather otherwise. Statute mandated the default position; the Secretary of State was now to detain the Claimant, a foreign criminal subject to a deportation order, not to release him, unless it was inappropriate to exercise this power. Insofar as there was an action plan for the next review period (of 28 days) it was to "await an avenue to make an application for an ETD following the order for the closure of the Iranian Embassy". The officer authorising detention for a further period of 28 days recorded: "… [W]e need to ensure that we establish Mr Qaza's true nationality as previously requested." There is no record as to what, if anything, had been done in response to these previous requests, which had already been recorded on 10 September, 8 October and 5 November.
31. By 31 December 2012 there had been no obvious progress concerning deportation. The Claimant's judicial review proceedings already mentioned had resulted in the order by Walker J that the Claimant be bailed to Hillingdon Social Services, if they could safely accommodate him. The detention review authorised his detention based on the risk of harm, pending confirmation on the basis of a suitable address to which the Claimant could safely be released into the care of Hillingdon. But no such address was available and he was not released.
32. By 28 January 2013 the relevant senior officer recorded that "despite the JR proceedings and extant confusion as to nationality, I consider that removal within a reasonable timeframe remains feasible". On the basis of the risk of further offending and of absconding, detention was authorised. But now, a new factor came into play, since it was recognised, or at least suspected, that it might be possible to enforce deportation of the Claimant to the area of Iraq controlled by the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) if it should prove that the Claimant came from that area of Iraq. Bio-data checks were to be pursued to assist with provision of Iraqi ETD at a future date, and to enable checks with the KRG. Bio-data were provided on 8 February 2013; the Claimant reiterated his claim to come from Tete, Sardasht, Iran. Detention was further authorised on 25 February 2013; the view was taken that the Claimant was not cooperating with the documentation process and that, if only he would do so, deportation to the area of the KRG could be effected.
33. By 25 March 2013 the view was expressly taken that the Claimant was "deceptive regarding his nationality". The Facilitated Return Scheme was to be promoted to him, and his detention was further authorised.
34. By 22 April 2013 it was recorded that the Claimant had presented an Iranian birth certificate (actually, just a photocopy), which had not been established to have been forged. The responsible officer was to identify which nationality was being pursued in respect of the Claimant. If it was accepted that he was Iranian, despite the arguments against that conclusion arising from the Claimant's scant knowledge of the relevant area, then release should be considered. It is to be noted that, even at this late stage, the possibility that the Claimant was from Iran was not being altogether discounted, merely heavily doubted. For the present, there was sufficient risk of harm and of re-offending to justify further detention, which was therefore authorised.
35. By 17 May 2013 there was no prospect of removal of the Claimant to Iran in the short to medium term. He was still suspected to be Iraqi and not cooperating. The reporting officer recommended (on 16 May) that he should be released under rigorous management. He could not be equipped with ETD for Iran and there was no bio-data to link him to Iraq, despite the interpreter's suspicions about his origins. The authorising officer disagreed with the recommendation for release and authorised detention for a further 28 days, wishing to concentrate on the undisputed fact that Claimant was Kurdish, and the possibility that it might be possible to link him to Iraq. Instructions were given for enquiries to be put in train so as to effect completion of bio-data information on the basis of such records as were available, including hospital and social service records.
36. On 27 May 2013 the Claimant started a hunger strike, refusing food and, from time to time, fluids. He refused to undergo medical examination on 9 June 2013, but was assessed, by reference to notes, as being fit for detention and to fly. His detention was authorised. The barriers to deportation were recorded as the outstanding judicial review application concerning his age, and the issues as to his nationality. Removal was regarded as "imminent" subject to those significant matters. The risk of harm, likelihood of reoffending and risk of absconding were again relied on. The medical advice was noted and, apparently, accepted.
37. The enquiries as to Kurdish Iraqi origin bore no fruit. There was still nothing on file to link the Claimant to Iraq, the bio-data form completed at an earlier stage (8 February 2013) related only to Iran. It was proposed to seek ETD for deportation to the area of the KRG. On 12 June 2013 the proposal was recorded to make to the KRG authorities an application for a travel document or clearance. An outcome was hoped for within 4-6 weeks. Detention was again authorised for 28 days. Again the Claimant was assessed as medically fit to be detained.
38. On 20 June 2013 the Claimant's health was assessed by Dr Naomi Hartree of Medical Justice on the instructions of the Claimant's solicitors. She had previously conducted telephone conversations with the Claimant but now had the opportunity to examine him. In a long report, she recorded that he appeared to have been refusing food for 31 days, was visibly dehydrated, weak, lethargic and severely malnourished. She doubted that he had capacity rationally to weigh up the consequences of refusing food and fluids. He was, she thought, unfit to fly because he was actively suicidal, in an unstable mental state and physically ill.
39. A judicial review pre-action protocol letter was sent on 13 June 2013. On 24 June 2013 bail was granted by an Immigration Judge and, on the same date, the present proceedings were commenced.

Arguments

40. On behalf of the Claimant, it is contended that at all material times during his detention the Defendant was aware that the Claimant could not be removed to Iran, due to the closure of the Iranian Embassy. Similarly, at all material times until January 2013 he could not be returned involuntarily to Iraq. It was accepted at the hearing that, latterly at least, enforced return to the KRG area of Iraq was a possibility. This, however was not envisaged even as a possibility until January 2013. In those circumstances, since detention was only a tool for enforcing deportation, the only appropriate course was to release the Claimant. The Defendant was at fault in failing to do so at all material times after conclusion of his prison sentence.
41. The highest point of the Claimant's case related to the period from 16 July 2012 (release from prison sentence) to 28 January 2013 (when the possibility of deportation to the area of the KRG was first raised).
42. The Defendant's answer to this is that the key issue is whether or not there was a reasonable prospect of removal of the Claimant from the UK within a reasonable time. The Claimant had been convicted of a serious criminal offence and it was likely that a deportation order would be made, as in due course it was. Although (of course) the detention reviews discussed removal to Iran, it was not the Defendant's case that there was a reasonable prospect of removal to Iran. The point was that there was a reasonable prospect of removing him from the UK. The Claimant had initially lied about coming from Albania. There was strong reason to doubt his second version, that he came from Iran, about which country he was vague and ignorant of basic information. The Secretary of State was, in short, entitled to detain him, to see if his position changed and, in the meantime, to do everything reasonably possible to document him in order to effect deportation to the appropriate destination having regard to his true nationality.
43. I accept the Defendant's submissions on this aspect of the case. It was quite plainly appropriate to detain the Claimant at the conclusion of his prison sentence. The Claimant's contention that detention was unlawful with effect from completion of the custodial portion of his prison sentence on 16 July 2012 is, in my judgment, completely unrealistic. Although it had not yet been made, a deportation order was highly likely. Against the background of the statutory scheme, the Claimant's established offending, the risk he presented of causing further harm, and the possibility that he might abscond in order to prevent deportation, it was not unreasonable to detain him on release from prison and he was not so detained for longer than a reasonable time. I would go further, and conclude that in the light of the likely deportation order it would not have been sensible for the Defendant to release the Claimant into the community in these circumstances. When the deportation order was made on 15 November 2012 the statutory regime mandated by s 36(2) of the UK Borders Act 2007 required detention of the Claimant unless the Defendant thought it inappropriate, subject to the principles mentioned above. Then, once the possibility of deportation to the KRG area arose on 28 January 2013 the case for detaining the Claimant was stronger.
44. The criticism is made that the Defendant did not act with reasonable expedition in investigating the Claimant's background and in progressing (if it could be progressed) deportation to the KRG area. Once deportation to the KRG area was identified as the appropriate course, on 16 May 2013, not enough, argues the Claimant, was done; he was being detained in the hope that something might turn up. It was therefore unlawful to detain him.
45. The Claimant points to a number of actions which could and, he contends, should have been taken in order to progress matters more swiftly. A technical linguistic analysis should have been undertaken so as to follow up the interpreter's suspicions that the Claimant was from Iraq, not Iran. The submission goes so far as to suggest that it should have been carried out by a Swedish commercial organisation called Skandinavisk Språkanalys AB, whose operations and methodology were discussed in Secretary of State for the Home Department v MN and KY [2014] UKSC 30. The Claimant's fingerprints should have been taken. His Iranian biodata should have been sent to the KRG. He should have been provided for interview to KRG officials, and the possibility that he might have, or obtain, a KRG identity card should have been followed through.
46. I agree, with the advantage of hindsight, that it is possible to see that things could have been done more quickly, particularly if resources, doubtless limited and engaged elsewhere, had been re-directed specifically at the case of the Claimant. But in my judgment the failure to take these steps, if otherwise appropriate, is at most an example of administrative failing falling well short of illegality (see Krasniqi already mentioned). It is clear that the Claimant was detained for the purpose of deporting him. Whether deportation could be effected within a reasonable time was clearly in the minds of those acting on behalf of the Defendant. The Claimant could not be detained indefinitely in the hope that something might turn up, and he was not being so detained, as is clear from the detention reviews in May and June 2013.
47. A separate point is made in relation to the medical report of Dr Hartree dated 20 June 2013. This was provided to the Defendant by fax on 21 June 2013, under cover of a letter which dealt with questions of removal and Iraqi nationality; it said nothing about the report itself apart from enclosing it. The Claimant complains that the report was ignored by the Defendant. But at the oral hearing his argument was, initially, not that the poor state of health described by Dr Hartree meant that the Claimant should have been released. It was, rather, that the Claimant, who was on hunger strike, should have been taken to hospital, whether or not he wanted to go. The submission was modified somewhat, on reflection, to a contention that the Defendant should have used best endeavours to facilitate voluntary removal of the Claimant to hospital. It was not suggested what such endeavours might have required. I have no hesitation in rejecting the contention that there was anything unlawful in the way the Claimant was treated after receipt of Dr Hartree's report. The Claimant was, as a result of his hunger strike, in poor health; but he was under medical supervision in detention. For the Defendant not immediately to take him to hospital against his will, or to try to persuade him to go there, falls well short of unlawfulness.

Conclusion

48. In my judgment the Claimant's case that he was detained unlawfully for the whole of the period from 16 July 2012 until 24 June 2013 is unfounded and I reject it. He was detained for the purposes of deportation and, having regard to his history and criminal record, he was not detained for more than a reasonable period. Nor was he so detained without a reasonable prospect that he would be deported. I also reject the contentions that his detention was unlawful for any part of the period from 16 July 2012 until the date of the deportation order (15 November 2012) or until the date on which deportation to the KRG became a possibility (28 January 2013). Nor, the light of the possibility of deportation to the KRG, did detention become unlawful when it became clear that deportation to Iran was not possible in the short or medium term (16 May 2013). I also reject the contentions that such delay as there may have been in dealing with the Claimant's case crossed the borderline from administrative failing into illegality and that there was anything unlawful in the Defendant's reaction to the medical report of Dr Hartree.
49. In those circumstances I dismiss this claim for judicial review.