Eric Fripp

Practice Areas

Eric Fripp has appeared in many leading cases concerning refugees, immigration, nationality, and human rights. His practice extends across a wide spectrum covering these areas and he is noted for his thoroughness and skill as an advocate and for the breadth of his supporting interests in international affairs, legal and political philosophy, and history. In addition he is recognised internationally as a particular authority on international and domestic laws concerning nationality and statelessness including their interaction with international human rights laws and with the Refugee Convention 1951 and other protective instruments. Alongside his advocacy and advice work he has published numerous books, chapters in edited works, and articles in leading journals, particularly the International Journal of Refugee Law, the leading publication in its field. In 2024 he became an Associate (non-judicial) Member of the International Association of Refugee and Migration Law Judges. He has a particular commitment to careful analysis of relevant factual matters and the clear exposition of complex legal issues.

Career

Call: 1994

Professional Memberships

• Senior Visiting Fellow, Refugee Law Initiative, School of Advanced Study, University of London

• Constitutional and Administrative Law Bar Association (ALBA)

• Immigration Law Practitioners’ Association (ILPA)

• British Institute of International and Comparative Law (BIICL)

• European Society of International Law (ESIL-SEDI)

• International Law Association (British Branch)

• European Network on Statelessness (ENS)

Publications

The Law and Practice of Expulsion and Exclusion from the United Kingdom: Deportation, Removal, Exclusion and Deprivation of Citizenship (General Editor, with Rowena Moffatt and Ellis Wilford, deputy editors) (Hart, Oxford and Portland OR, 2014)

Nationality and Statelessness in the International Law of Refugee Status (Hart, Oxford and Portland OR, 2016)

Work Highlights

Recent cases

Superior Courts in UK/ European Court of Human Rights:

WAS (Pakistan) v SSHD [2023] EWCA Civ 894- Court endorsed and extended the ‘common-sense point’ of Sedley LJ at YB (Eritrea) v SSHD [2008] EWCA Civ 360 that in a sur place case ‘a tribunal cannot be criticised if it is prepared to infer successful covert activity on the basis of limited direct evidence’- ‘Those observations have even more force in the light of the great changes since 2008 in the sophistication of such methods, in the availability of electronic evidence of all sorts, and in the ease of their transmission.’ The UT erred by ‘losing sight of the fact that direct evidence about “the level of and the mechanics of monitoring” in the United Kingdom is unlikely to be available to an asylum claimant or to a dissident organisation’ as well as imposing too high a standard of proof.

R (SWP) v SSHD [2023] EWCA Civ 439- Court of Appeal dismissed appeal against exclusion of Toier 2 PBS migrant spouse from Destitution Domestic Violence Concession (‘DDVC’), but also refused Secretary of State’s application to file late evidence on appeal, applying Ladd v Marshall [1954] EWCA Civ 1; [1954] 1 WLR 1489, and reiterating public law defendant’s ‘duty of candour and cooperation with the court’ it being ‘important that the defendant public authority should set out an accurate factual position to the court’. Procedural rigour ‘applies as much to defendant public authorities as it does to claimants’.

Hussein (Ismail) v SSHD UKSC Ref 2020/0198 [2022] 12 WLUK 664; [2022] Lexis Citation 145; [2022] All ER (D) 13 (Sept)- Supreme Court allowed appeal from Court of Appeal re enhanced protection from deportation of long resident EU national, by consent, SSHD accepting CA erred in accepting reasons of FTT as adequately addressing question of ‘enhanced protection’ from deportation for EEA nationals who had gained permanent residence status and been continuously resident for 10 years ;

Hussein (Ismail) v SSHD [2020] EWCA Civ 156; [2020] 2 CMLR 34- Examines EEA provisions concerning deportation: nature of ‘enhanced protection’ from deportation for permanently resident EEA nationals continuously resident for 10 years, and of lesser ‘intermediate protection’ test of 'serious grounds of public policy or public security' as required by Article 28 of Directive 2004/38/EC. Allowed and remitted to UT(IAC) as regards intermediate protection, permission to appeal to Supreme Court granted re enhanced protection and Supreme Court set aside the decision against the appellant (see above);

WA (Pakistan) v SSHD [2019] EWCA Civ 302; [2019] All ER (D) 124 (Mar)- Important development on refugee law in context of freedom of religion and belief, including application of the 'right to live freely' in a protected identity per HJ (Iran) v SSHD; HT (Cameroon) v SSHD [2010] UKSC 31; [2011] 1 AC 596- the Court held that the UT(IAC) erred in its MN and others (Ahmadis - country conditions - risk) Pakistan CG [2012] UKUT 389 (IAC) country guidance by imposing requirement for ‘particular importance’ to expression of protected identity, an illegitimate fetter on refugee definition;

Industry Sector Expertise

• International and domestic laws relating to migration and refugee status

• International and domestic laws relating to nationality and statelessness

• International and domestic human rights law

• Public law/ judicial review