THE Scottish Courts have again given the Home Office a clear thumbs down after former Home Secretary Amber Rudd apparently ignored her own department’s advice on the security situation in a war-torn country.

In a damning judgement issued last week in the Court of Session, Lady Clark of Calton allowed a petition by an anonymous Iraqi man to be able to claim asylum in the UK under Human Rights laws on the right to a private life. Doctors testified that the man was chronically sick and would have difficulty if returned to Iraq.

Following an earlier decision by Prime Minister Theresa May when she was Home Secretary, last September Rudd also issued a decision letter that did not even allow the man to make a claim – he had previously been refused asylum and returned to the Kurdish part of Iraq in 2008.

In March last year, the Home Office issued an update on the security and humanitarian situation in Iraq, and judge Lady Clark said Rudd should have taken her department’s own advice into consideration.

Lady Clark wrote: “In reading the part of the decision letter dealing with private life, I can obtain no understanding of whether the respondent [Rudd] gave any thought to the humanitarian situation and problems which exist. “She gave no reasons to explain why these conditions would not be considered very significant obstacles to the petitioner’s integration into Iraq standing the very serious humanitarian problems which are described in the Kurdish Regional Government area.

“Further there is no attempt to factor in what may be additional personal problems for the petitioner because of his medical condition and employability. It is not sufficient in my opinion merely to consider the petitioner’s medical condition in isolation at a later part of the decision letter. “

Lady Clark went further: “The respondent in such consideration required to take into account the up to date information contained in the respondent’s own policy and information note dated March 2017.

“The humanitarian situation set out in the information note of March 2017 is in my opinion very concerning and can reasonably be thought to give rise to questions of whether there would be very significant obstacles to the petitioner’s integration particularly in circumstances where he also has long standing medical problems which require medication and are likely to impact upon his employability.

“I consider that it was unreasonable for the respondent to fail to properly consider the humanitarian problems highlighted in her own document of March 2017 and the particular circumstances of the petitioner and fail to give any adequate reasoning for the decision that an appeal to an immigration judge did not have a reasonable prospect of success in relation to private life.”

Lady Clark allowed the Iraqi man’s petition and dismissed the Home Office’s case.