Ryanair loses appeal

Judges in the Court of Appeal in London have ruled an airline is liable if it carries non-EU citizens into the UK without correct papers.

The judgment came in the case of Ryanair Ltd v Secretary of State for the Home Department.

Delivering their decision, Lady Justice King, Lord Justice Newey and Mr Justice MacDonald said “a valid residence card for the purposes of entry by a family member of a European Union national to the United Kingdom without a visa had to bear the words ‘Residence card of a family member of a Union citizen’.”

The judges said where a passenger failed to produce such a document and failed to establish a right of free movement in some other way, the home secretary was entitled to impose a charge on the carrier in respect of a passenger without proper documentation.

Ryanair had appealed against a decision which held the airline liable. Courts at a lower level have in the past criticised the absence of a proper definition of whether the falsity of a document was reasonably apparent.

It has also held that evidence in some cases fell short of establishing that a trained representative with a basic knowledge of identification of false documents should have been expected to pick up any irregularities.

http://www.bailii.org/ew/cases/EWCA/Civ/2018/899.html

www.ryanair.com

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