The case between Chowdhury v Secretary of State for the Home Department [2021] EWCA Civ 1220, recently heard at the Court of Appeal, confirmed that when an extended family member makes an application for an EEA residency card, the period of time where they are dependent on the EEA citizen sponsor must not be broken up by periods of time where they were not dependent on that person.
In short, this comes about because the point of granting rights to extended family members is in order to protect free movement rights for EEA citizens. If an extended family member is not a dependant at any given time, then there would be no need for them to have rights that protect the free movement of the EEA citizen in question.
This was an extremely important issue under the EEA Regulations 2016 (and also the 2006 version of the same rules). The tribunal’s decision has had a real practical impact – it limits the ability of certain extended family members of a sponsor to get access to the EEA residence documents that they need if they are to make an application for settled status. After Brexit, the Court of Appeal decision will now only be relevant to a relatively small number of people who have outstanding appeals or applications that were made under the Regulations.
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