Alpine Care UK Limited, R (on the application of) v Secretary of State for the Home Department

This is the judgment on a renewed application for permission for judicial review which I heard on Thursday 23 April 2026. Because of difficulties with counsel availability, I was unable to give my decision at the end of the hearing and so I reserved my judgment.

The Claimant was represented by Ms Shivani Jegarajah, and the Defendant was represented by Mr Matthew Howarth. Mr Howarth appeared by CVP link subsequent to an unopposed application to permit remote attendance which I had granted.

Alpine Care UK Limited (“the Claimant”) seeks permission for judicial review of the decision of the Secretary of State for the Home Department (“the Defendant”) on 6 February 2025 to revoke the Claimant’s Sponsor Licence. The Claimant is a regulated domiciliary care provider.

On 1 July 2025, HHJ Rawlings, sitting as a Judge of the High Court, refused permission on the papers and the Claimant thereafter applied for reconsideration. In his order refusing permission, HHJ Rawlings continued the interim relief that had previously been ordered by HHJ Richard Williams, sitting as a Judge of the High Court, which stayed the revocation pending the resolution of these proceedings. HHJ Rawlings ordered that the stay should continue until the application for reconsideration of permission had been determined.

The subsequent renewal hearings have been adjourned on two occasions.

A hearing on 26 September 2025 was adjourned following an application that was based on the health impacts of the litigation on the director.

A subsequent hearing on 6 March 2026 before HHJ Najib was adjourned following an application by the Claimant during the hearing to obtain legal representation and/or better prepare for the hearing. HHJ Najib ordered that the Claimant should pay the Defendant’s costs thrown away by the adjournment and gave directions for this hearing. Those included the filing of a skeleton argument and a bundle. A bundle was subsequently filed in accordance with HHJ Najib’s directions, together with a skeleton argument for the hearing which had been prepared by Dr Kahlon, a director of the Claimant.

I can set out the relevant factual background relatively briefly.

On 25 July 2022 the Claimant was granted a sponsor licence by the Defendant.

On 17 September 2024 the Defendant’s officers attended the Claimant’s premises as part of a compliance visit to assess its suitability as a sponsor.

Two days later on 19 September 2024 the Claimant sent evidence to the Defendant’s officers following the compliance visit.

On 16 December 2024 the Defendant suspended the Claimant’s licence because of breaches of the sponsorship duties and Guidance. The Claimant was given 20 working days to file representations and evidence in response.

The Claimant filed representations and evidence thereafter on 19 December 2024.

Those representations were considered by the Defendant but on 6 February 2025 the Defendant revoked the Claimant’s licence, thereby removing it from the register of licensed providers. It is that decision which is under challenge in these proceedings. A number of reasons were given for the decision. The decision itself is at 417-432 of the Claimant’s bundle and falls to be considered in its entirety.

In the Claim Form, at page 20-21 of the bundle, the Claimant advanced four grounds of challenge:

At the outset of the hearing, Ms Jegarajah indicated that the Claimant accepted that the breaches of the licence that had been identified were each sufficient whether singularly or in combination to justify revocation. She abandoned Grounds Two, Three and Four and advanced her submissions solely in relation to the procedural fairness ground. In doing so, Ms Jegarajah applied for permission for the skeleton argument (drafted by her client) to stand as an amended Statement of Facts and Grounds. No application notice had been issued by the Claimant nor indeed had any informal notice been given beforehand to the Defendant.

I refused the Claimant’s application on the basis that it would cause prejudice to the Defendant and would inevitably lead to yet another adjournment with the attendant waste of costs. To grant such an application would be to run counter to the need for procedural rigour in judicial review which has been emphasised by a number of cases: see R (Spahiu) v Secretary of State for the Home Department: Practice Note [2018] EWCA Civ 2064; [2019] 1 WLR 1297, at para. 2, where earlier authorities are set out (Coulson LJ), and R (Dolan) v Secretary of State for Health and Social Care [2020] EWCA Civ 1605, [2021] 1 WLR 232. Nonetheless, I explained that the pleaded procedural fairness ground was already advanced by reference to an alleged failure to assess properly the Claimant’s evidence that had been submitted.

The Claimant’s central submission was that the decision was procedurally unfair because it was not made solely on the basis of the material that the Claimant had submitted in response to the suspension letter sent on 16 December 2024. In that letter the Defendant had explained that the Claimant had 20 working days to make representations including evidence in response to the letter. That letter identified documents which should be submitted as part of any representations. The Claimant argued that having submitted those documents it was procedurally unfair for the Defendant to issue the impugned decision. The Claimant also argued that it was procedurally unfair as the revocation decision was undermined by evidence which the Claimant subsequently submitted.

The Defendant argued that the Claimant’s argument was misconceived. The revocation decision had to be understood in the context of the statutory regime. As the guidance states, sponsorship is a privilege not a right – see para L.2.1 and the judgment of Haddon-Cave LJ in R (London St Andrew’s College) v Secretary of State for the Home Department [2018] EWCA Civ 2496 at para 29. The Defendant is entitled to adopt a light trigger approach and a fairly high index of suspicion. There was no requirement on the Defendant to specify each and every document that a claimant should submit in response to a letter of suspension. The requirements of procedural fairness in this case were very different from those where the Defendant suspected dishonesty on the part of a sponsor. Even if there had been procedural unfairness on the basis advanced then the relief must be refused as the outcome for the Claimant would not have been substantially different.

The question for me is whether or not the Claimant has advanced an arguable ground of challenge which has a realistic prospect of success and which merits full investigation at an oral hearing with all the parties and the relevant evidence.

In my judgment the Claimant’s procedural fairness ground does not have a realistic prospect of success.

First, it is clear from the suspension letter that the Claimant was required to make representations in relation to all of the points that had been raised (see paragraphs 23, 24 and 27 of the letter). There is nothing in the letter to suggest that it would only be sufficient to supply the particular documents that had been identified. Paragraph 24 of the suspension letter states: “You have 20 working days from the date of this letter to make representations including, submitting evidence, in response to this letter. If you do choose to submit representations, as well as responding to the points above you must provide the following supporting documents…” (Emphasis added).

In any event, the Defendant does not have to spell out all the documents that need to be produced (see R (Manzay Ltd) v SSHD (2016) EWHC 2582 (Admin)). The Defendant was required to give the Claimant fair notice of the concerns which he had and a fair opportunity to respond to those concerns, whether by evidence or otherwise: see R (London Reading College Ltd) v SSHD (2010) EWHC 2561 (Admin) at paras 28 to 41. That requirement was amply fulfilled by the suspension letter.

Secondly, it is not arguable that the Defendant failed properly to assess the evidence that had been submitted by the Claimant. The impugned decision sets out the Defendant’s consideration of the evidence and representations point by point.

Thirdly, the procedural fairness challenge to the impugned decision falls to be considered by reference to the representations and evidence submitted before it was made. As the Claimant’s counsel recognised in the course of her submissions, it cannot sensibly be criticised in that respect by reference to any evidence submitted subsequently.

Fourthly, even if this ground was arguable, I would be required to refuse permission given the concession that has been made by the Claimant that each of the breaches identified whether individually or in combination would justify revocation. That is the effect of section 31(2A) of the Senior Courts Act 1981 which provides that the High Court “must refuse to grant relief on an application for judicial review….if it appears to the court to be highly likely that the outcome for the applicant would not have been substantially different if the conduct complained of had not occurred.”

Finally, and for completeness, I should add that the other aspects of the pleaded procedural fairness ground (which were not advanced in oral submissions at all) are not arguable. The Defendant was not required to issue a Sponsor Action Plan (SAP). An SAP is, as per paragraph C7.25 of Part 3 of the Guidance, imposed for breaches which amount to a “relatively minor issue”. As to the argument that the decision was procedurally unfair because the Defendant had failed to follow their own guidance which stated that revocation was a last resort, that too is misconceived. As noted by HHJ Rawlings in his order refusing permission, one of the Defendant’s grounds of revocation was mandatory (C1 aa) and the others fell into the “will normally revoke” category (C2 b).

For these reasons the application for permission for judicial review is refused.

It necessarily follows that the stay ordered by HHJ Richard Williams and continued pending the determination of this renewal application by HHJ Rawlings, now falls away.