TK, R (on the application of) v Secretary of State for the Home Department (VTS leave – unpublished policy)

Facts

The applicant, TK, a disputed national of Eritrea who fled in 2002, lived in Sudan and travelled through the Middle East and Europe before arriving in the United Kingdom in February 2015. After an unsuccessful asylum claim he received a positive reasonable grounds decision on 14 April 2022 and on 26 January 2024 was conclusively recognised as a victim of trafficking for forced labour in Syria, where he had been exploited for about four months, forced to work for free, physically and sexually tortured and threatened with death, causing post-traumatic stress disorder and major depressive disorder, together with chronic pain and other physical complications requiring long-term specialist therapy of no stated duration. On 8 January 2025, upheld on reconsideration on 17 February 2025, the Secretary of State granted him 12 months' temporary permission to stay under section 65 of the Nationality and Borders Act 2022 and Appendix VTS. Judicial review was brought on 8 April 2025 and permission granted on both original grounds. On 27 October 2025 the Secretary of State disclosed an unwritten practice of granting 12 months' leave where treatment is open-ended, a disclosure she accepted breached her duty of candour. Permission to amend to add a challenge to that practice was granted by Upper Tribunal Judge Pinder by order sealed 11 February 2026. A fresh grant of four months' leave on 10 March 2026 led to grounds 1 and 2 being settled by consent order on 26 March 2026, leaving only ground 3.