AOC16 v Minister for Immigration and Citizenship [2026] FCA 288

1. The Tribunal hearing necessarily related to the issues the Tribunal was required to decide, namely, whether the criteria for the grant of the visa were satisfied. AOC16 submitted that the Tribunal had not attempted to understand his personal situation and appeared to be against him from the outset. It is understandable that AOC16 may have felt that the Tribunal lacked sympathy with his circumstances, because the Tribunal's questioning (as explained in its judgment) was directed to the particular visa criteria and the Tribunal's concerns about AOC16's apparent inability to satisfy the legal requirements for the grant of the visa. There is no material before the Court to suggest that there was a denial of procedural fairness; on the contrary, the reasons of the Tribunal suggest that the Tribunal appropriately drew AOC16's attention to the issues that properly arose before it. It follows that the primary judge was correct to dismiss the ground of judicial review based on a denial of procedural fairness.
2. The second ground of appeal asserts that the primary judge dismissed AOC16's application without considering the legal and factual errors contained in the decision of the Tribunal. This ground also lacks any particularisation. When given the opportunity to elaborate in oral submissions, AOC16 was not able to articulate any particular legal or other error in the reasoning of the Tribunal. Before the primary judge, AOC16 submitted that provisions of the Migration Act 1958 (Cth) had not been followed and that the Tribunal had misunderstood the nature of his evidence. All of these complaints were expressed in general terms, and no specific alleged error was identified.
3. To the extent that AOC16 expresses disagreement with findings of fact made by the Tribunal, that does not itself identify any jurisdictional error. The Tribunal set out the basis for its findings, including statements against AOC16's interest which the Tribunal recorded him as having made in answer to direct questions in the Tribunal hearing. The findings of the Tribunal supported its conclusion that the requirements set out in cll 602.215(1) and 602.212(6) were not met. For these reasons, the primary judge did not err in the manner asserted in the second ground of appeal.
4. I have considered whether there is any further basis, albeit not articulated by AOC16, on which the appeal might be allowed. As explained above, it appears to me that the Tribunal was wrong to state that the only subclause of cl 602.212 of Schedule 2 to the Migration Regulations which was relevant to AOC16's application for a Medical Treatment (subclass 602) visa was cl 602.212(6). Based on the way the visa application form was completed, it is clear that the subclause that was most relevant to AOC16's visa application was cl 602.212(2). It may be, as the Minister submitted, that the Tribunal's reasons were poorly expressed but that the actual reason it did not specifically address cl 602.212(2) was because the Tribunal had formed the view that it was not satisfied that AOC16 intended to remain in Australia temporarily for the purpose of seeking medical treatment.
5. In any event, having regard to the criteria prescribed for the grant of a Medical Treatment (subclass 602) visa, the Tribunal's conclusions (a) that AOC16 did not satisfy the requirement in cl 602.215(1), and (b) that he did not satisfy the requirement in cl 602.212(6), had the consequence that the Tribunal was bound to affirm the decision of the Minister's delegate to refuse to grant the visa. Any error on the part of the Tribunal as to the relevance of cl 602.212(2) of Schedule 2 to the Migration Regulations could not possibly have led to a different result, and so was not a jurisdictional error: see LPDT v Minister for Immigration, Citizenship, Migrant Services and Multicultural Affairs (2024) 280 CLR 321; [2024] HCA 12 at 328- 9 [14]‑[16] (Gageler CJ, Gordon, Edelman, Steward, Gleeson and Jagot JJ).
6. Finally, both before the primary judge and in this Court, the Minister properly drew attention to the fact that the Tribunal had proceeded on a wrong understanding of the law. The Tribunal appears to have considered that it could grant AOC16 a visa even though the requirement in cl 602.215(1) was not satisfied, if there were "exceptional or compelling circumstances" to do so. In considering this further issue, the Tribunal had regard to an irrelevant consideration. In any event, the Tribunal found that there were no exceptional or compelling circumstances in this case. As the primary judge said, "[h]aving first raised the straw man, the Tribunal then knocked it over". While it was an error of law for the Tribunal to consider this issue, the error could not possibly have made a difference to the outcome, and so was not material to the Tribunal's decision.

(2024) 280 CLR 321