The Federal Court held that the Tribunal breached s 425 of the Migration Act by failing to afford a meaningful opportunity to present evidence on the factual foundations of witnesses' beliefs as to the genuineness of the appellant's conversion to Christianity in Australia, having dismissed such evidence as irrelevant at the hearing. The Court further held that the Tribunal failed to discharge its s 414 review function by allowing an adverse credibility finding regarding the appellant's claimed activities in Bangladesh to subsume independent assessment of the distinct possibility of genuine conversion in Australia, contrary to the AZU15 caution against blanket credibility findings. The apprehended bias ground was rejected, with the Court drawing a distinction between a closed mind and a misconceived view as to the utility of evidence.
The full text is available to signed-in members.