Immigration: Home Office not served with material
The ability of AI to generate documents and other material could pose “an existential threat to the integrity of the immigration appeal system”, the Upper Tribunal (UT) has warned.
“In the appeals before us we have seen authentic looking bank statements, money transfer documents, residence cards, birth and death certificates, and email correspondence all of which, on examination and without explanation, have been found not to be genuine,” it said.
The UT used its decisions [1] in five of 10 appeals that all displayed “certain characteristics indicative of abuse of the immigration appeal system”, to issue detailed guidance on how judges should deal with potentially fraudulent applications.
The appeals related to applications under the EU Settlement Scheme, typically made with the applicant claiming to be a relative of an EEA national with limited leave or settled status in the UK. In each case, the UT dismissed their appeals against the refusal of their applications.
It said an overarching characteristic of the cases were the steps taken to prevent the Home Office from having the chance “to consider and test the evidence that has been provided, often at the last minute, before a hearing or the appeal being determined ‘on the papers’”.
Appeals were often allowed because the First-tier Tribunal judge was unaware that the evidence had not been served on the Home Office.
Where the UT directed attendance of the appellant to address allegations of false evidence, applications to adjourn or withdraw the appeal were often made, the judges noted.
“Another common feature of some of the appeals before us is that the email address provided for the appellant bears no resemblance to their name.
“In fact, a striking feature of the appeals is that on closer analysis of the relevant records, it has become apparent that often the same email addresses have been used for several applications by different appellants or sponsors, who are otherwise unconnected.”
In almost all of the appeals, the appellants were self-represented. However, the UT noted that “fraudulent applications can still occur where the appellant is legally represented for either the whole or part of the proceedings”.
It pointed to a case we reported in July [2] where a judge expressed deep concern over how a law firm had run cases, with multiple clients relying on materially similar documents when applying for visit visas.
The UT stressed that it was not seeking “to deprecate the proper use of AI tools” by applicants in person, which “has the potential to be of material assistance”.
It went on: “The suspected use of an AI generative tool is not by itself an indication of fraud, but the possibility of misuse cannot be underestimated in an increasingly digital era.
“The ability of AI models to generate material, including documents, is capable of posing an existential threat to the integrity of the immigration appeal system, and requires particular vigilance.”
A separate UT decision [3], meanwhile, revealed that two people at East London law firm Sarker Solicitors have reported themselves to the Solicitors Regulation Authority over using AI to generate the grounds of appeal and skeleton argument.
UT Judge Keith, sitting with chamber president Mr Justice Lavender, said the “serious procedural irregularities” in the case were not so much caused by AI but by the solicitors’ misuse of it.
He went on: “The appellant’s solicitors filed with the UT, as part of a formal legal process, seriously misleading grounds of appeal, asserting: that a judge had stated certain things in his judgment, when he had not; that the evidence stated certain things, which it did not; and that legal cases were authorities for various legal principles, when they were not.
“This occurred because Sarker Solicitors did not check the accuracy of the grounds of appeal, did not consider the grant of permission and did not check the accuracy of the skeleton argument.
“Both were produced by a junior member of staff, namely a paralegal, using ChatGPT, which itself raises significant concerns about client confidentiality and legal privilege.
“Throughout this, it appears that Mr Sarker’s supervision of the paralegal did not begin to mitigate the risk of filing seriously misleading submissions. We say no more, as that is a matter for the Solicitors Regulation Authority.”