The Court of Appeal in Entry Clearance Officer v BB & Ors considered what counts as family life between adults under Article 8 of the European Convention on Human Rights, in an appeal against Upper Tribunal decisions allowing family reunion appeals.
Key facts
- Who: People in immigration appeals where Article 8 family life between adult relatives, such as parents and adult children or adult siblings, is in issue.
- From: Judgment dated 31 July 2026
- Source: Entry Clearance Officer v BB & Ors [2026] EWCA Civ 973
The Court of Appeal (Lord Justice Newey, Lord Justice Singh and Lord Justice Baker) handed down its judgment on 31 July 2026, after a hearing on 15 July 2026. Lord Justice Singh wrote the judgment. The main issue was the meaning of "family life" between adults in Article 8, particularly in the immigration context.
Background
The respondents are Afghan nationals living in Turkey without immigration leave: a mother, three sisters, and the son and daughter of one of those sisters. The father, an original respondent, died while the appeal was pending. They applied in May 2022 for entry clearance to join their son and brother, referred to in the judgment as S, who is a refugee in the UK.
The applications were refused on 8 August 2023. The Entry Clearance Officer concluded that refusal would not breach Article 8 because there was no relevant family life. The First-tier Tribunal (Immigration and Asylum Chamber) dismissed the appeals, in a decision promulgated on 23 July 2024. It found that the contact and concern between the relatives were ordinary emotional ties rather than real, committed or effective support.
The Upper Tribunal found on 14 February 2025 that the First-tier Tribunal had erred in law. It remade the decision on 27 August 2025, finding that family life existed and that refusal was a disproportionate interference, and allowed the appeals on human rights grounds. The Entry Clearance Officer appealed to the Court of Appeal with permission.
The question
What must be shown for family life to exist between adult relatives, and was the test applied by the tribunals the right one?
The Court's reasoning on the test
Both tribunals proceeded on the test as developed in the Court of Appeal, in particular the comments of Sedley LJ in Kugathas v Secretary of State for the Home Department [2003] EWCA Civ 31 on dependency and "real", "committed" or "effective" support. The Court was told that those comments had been followed in the tribunals at least since Rai v Entry Clearance Officer, New Delhi [2017] EWCA Civ 320.
Since the tribunals decided this case, however, the Court of Appeal in IA and others v Secretary of State for the Home Department [2025] EWCA Civ 1516 disapproved those comments. Summarising IA, Singh LJ said the consistent case law of the European Court of Human Rights is that family life is normally limited to the "core" family. There is no family life between parents and adult children, or between adult siblings, unless they show additional elements of dependence involving more than normal emotional ties.
In IA, the Court of Appeal held that the "real, effective or committed support" test is lower than the additional elements of dependence test, which is the correct one.
What this means for people in appeals involving adult relatives
Article 8 family life can extend beyond parents and children under 18, for example to a parent and an adult child or to adult siblings. The "core" of the right concerns a parent and a child under 18.
Following IA, the test for family life between adults is the additional elements of dependence test, not the lower "real, effective or committed support" test the tribunals applied in this case.
Sources
- Entry Clearance Officer v BB & Ors [2026] EWCA Civ 973, Court of Appeal (Civil Division), 31 July 2026: https://caselaw.nationalarchives.gov.uk/ewca/civ/2026/973