KHATRI DINESH v. TORTURE CLAIMS APPEAL BOARD/ NON REFOULEMENT CLAIMS PETITION OFFICE

CACV 607/2018

[2019] HKCA 696

IN THE HIGH COURT OF THE

HONG KONG SPECIAL ADMINISTRATIVE REGION

COURT OF APPEAL

CIVIL APPEAL NO 607 OF 2018

(ON APPEAL FROM HCAL NO 155 OF 2018)

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J U D G M E N T

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Hon Poon JA (giving the Judgment of the Court) :

1.  By a judgment dated 7 May 2019 ([2019] HKCA 497), the Court of Appeal (Poon JA and Lisa Wong J) dismissed the applicant’s appeal against the decision of Deputy High Court Judge Josiah Lam (“the Judge”) dated 12 December 2018 refusing to grant leave to him to apply for judicial review.  By a notice of motion dated 14 May 2019, the applicant now seeks leave to appeal to the Court of Final Appeal.

2.  In the notice of motion, the applicant set out the following grounds :

(1)   There was a lack of legal and language assistance for his BOR 2 claim before the Director of Immigration (“the Director”) and the Director had failed to inform him of his right under BOR 2 claim. 

(2)   The Judge cherry-picked information and failed to properly and sufficiently consider his grounds of appeal.  

(3)   The judges erred in finding that the lack of language assistance would not affect his case on his BOR 2 claim due to the reason that he did not produce any further documents or evidence to support his case.

3.  In compliance with the directions given by the Registrar of Civil Appeals on 15 May 2019, the applicant lodged his written submissions on 28 May 2019.  In his written submissions, the applicant repeated his arguments previously advanced in the appeal, which were canvassed and dismissed for the reasons set out at [11] and [12] of our judgment.

4.  Pursuant to paragraph 3 of Practice Direction 2.1, the Registrar of Civil Appeals directed on 15 May 2019 that the Notice of Motion shall be determined on paper only without an oral hearing.  As it is appropriate to do so, this application shall be determined on paper accordingly.

5.  Under section 22(1)(b) of the Hong Kong Court of Final Appeal Ordinance, Cap 484, leave to appeal to the Court of Final Appeal may be granted if the question involved in the appeal is one which, by reason of its great general or public importance, or otherwise, ought to be submitted to the Court of Final Appeal for decision.  For the reasons that we gave in our judgment, we do not see any prospect of success in the applicant’s intended appeal against the Judge’s order.  None of the questions raised by the applicant in the notice of motion or in his written submissions gives rise to any question of great general or public importance or is one that ought to be submitted to the Court of Final Appeal for decision.  Nor do we see any basis to grant leave under the “otherwise” limb.  The statutory criteria for granting leave to appeal to the Court of Final Appeal under section 22(1)(b) of the Hong Kong Court of Final Appeal Ordinance (Cap. 484) are not met.

6.  Accordingly, we refuse to give the applicant leave to appeal to the Court of Final Appeal and dismiss his notice of motion.