AZ -v- Secretary of State for the Home Department and another (anonymity order)

Administrative CourtHigh CourtKing's Bench DivisionAnonymity Order

Claim number: AC-2023-LON-002407

In the High Court of Justice
King’s Bench Division
Administrative Court

31 August 2023

Before:

The Honourable Hugh Mercer KC sitting as a Deputy Judge of the High Court

Between:

The King on the application of
AZ

-v-

Secretary of State for the Home Department

and

Secretary of State for Justice

Order

On an application by the Claimant for directions for interim relief and for an order of anonymity.

Following consideration of the documents lodged by the Claimant

ORDER of the Honourable Hugh Mercer KC sitting as a Deputy Judge of the High Court

  1. The application in the Claim Form for a response to interim relief within 14 days and in the draft directions order for interim relief for a response within 7 days of the Order are refused.
  2. The Defendant and Interested Party shall file any response to the Claimant’s application for interim relief within the 21 day period for filing of the Acknowledgment of Service in CPR 54.8(2)(a).
  3. The application for interim relief shall be placed before a Judge immediately after filing of any response or, in default, of the Acknowledgment of Service.
  4. Any inter-partes hearing on interim relief be listed within 7 days thereafter.
  5. The application for anonymity is granted, with liberty to any person to apply to vary or discharge anonymity on notice to the parties.
  6. Pending further Order, pursuant to CPR 39.2 the Claimant is granted anonymity and shall be known as “AZ” and there shall be no publication of his name or any information that might lead to him being identified.

Reasons

  1. The interim relief directions were not sought as an urgent application under Practice Direction 54B and no N463 has been issued. In R(AZ) v SSHD and ECO (Teheran), CO/2397/2023, Mr Justice Fordham indicated that urgent applications must be made by the specified procedure and not by requesting that ‘non-urgent’ applications be considered urgently.
  2. The applications in the Claim Form (within 14 days, i.e. 4 September) and the draft Order attached thereto (within 7 days of Order, i.e. 7 September) are to be compared with 11 September, being deadline for AOS provided that Defendant and Interested Party served on day of issue (which I understand to be 21 August 2023). If Claimant seeks a shorter deadline, he needs to use the specified procedure.
  3. In making a first Order pre-permission, I am conscious that this Order will be available from the Court files and, acting protectively, I am satisfied that there is a CPR 39.2(4) necessity, but I am also conscious that I do not have available to me any response from the Defendant or Interested Party and so anonymity can be revisited subsequently if any concern were raised in this regard.