By: Matt Donmall

The Mau Mau litigation: fear is not a personal injury

7 August 2018 by Matt Donmall

Kimathi & Ors v Foreign and Commonwealth Office [2018] EWHC 1305 (QB) – read judgment.

Stewart J has recently dismissed the first test case in this group litigation, in which over 40,000 Kenyans bring claims for damages against the UK Foreign & Commonwealth Office, alleging abuse during the Kenyan Emergency of the 1950s and early 1960s, in Kimathi & Others v The Foreign and Commonwealth Office [2018] EWHC 2066 (QB). Jo Moore discusses this in her blog post of 6 August 2018.

Earlier this year however he considered, as a preliminary matter, whether fear, caused either by the tort of negligence or trespass, amounts to personal injury so that the Court has the discretionary power to exclude the 3-year limitation period which arises under section 11 of the 1980 Act. Stewart J concluded that “despite the comprehensive and innovative submissions of the Claimants” (para 37), which included arguments on human rights grounds, fear did not amount to a personal injury.
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Court of Appeal: immigration age assessments and Merton

6 January 2016 by Matt Donmall

Two recent Court of Appeal cases, heard together, have considered the legality of the immigration detention of those who are, or possibly are, minors. Such cases involve local authority age assessments, which are to be carried out according to the guidance set out in Merton [2003] EWHC 1689 (Admin).
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Not breach of rights to force doctor to disclose patient records

13 January 2011 by Matt Donmall

Gillberg v Sweden – 41723/06 [2010] ECHR 1676 (2 November 2010) – Read judgment

A Swedish professor has failed in his European Court of Human Rights challenge to his conviction for disobeying a court order to hand over sensitive information in medical research, despite having promised the participants that the information would be for his use alone.

As reported in a past blog, the fact of their confidentiality does not preclude the medical records of third party patients being disclosed in legal proceedings. So too in relation to sensitive information given confidentially in the context of medical research, in view of the recent Strasbourg case of Gillberg v Sweden (Application no. 41723/06).

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Can political asylum seekers be expected to hide their political opinions?

13 August 2010 by Matt Donmall

Expected to show him support?

TM (Zimbabwe) and others v Secretary of State for the Home Department [2010] EWCA Civ 916 – Read judgment

Is it reasonable to expect an asylum seeker on their return to their home country to lie about their political beliefs and thereby avoid persecution? This question was recently addressed by the Court of Appeal in light of a potentially wide-ranging decision of the Supreme Court relating to gay refugees.

Last month the Supreme Court held in HJ (Iran ) v Secretary of State for the Home Department [2010] UKSC 31 that to compel a homosexual person to pretend that their sexuality does not exist is to deny him his fundamental right to be who he is (see our post). When an applicant applies for asylum on the ground of a well-founded fear of persecution because he is gay, if the tribunal concludes that a material reason for his living discreetly on his return would be a fear of the persecution which would follow if he were to live openly as a gay man, then his application should be accepted [para 82].

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