KMV v 1) Secretary of State for Work and Pensions 2) QRB (CSM): [2026] UKUT 359 (AAC)
Upper Tribunal Administrative Appeals Chamber decision by Judge Citron on 17 September 2026.
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Judicial Summary
An issue before the First-tier Tribunal in this case was whether the Appellant’s 17-year-old daughter, D, had her home with her mother, the Second Respondent, and was usually provided day to day care by her (these being the relevant limbs of the definition of a “person with care” for child support purposes). The Appellant (father) attended the First-tier Tribunal hearing but the Second Respondent (mother) did not, and the First-tier Tribunal proceeded in the absence of the Second Respondent. The decision of the First-tier Tribunal rejected the Appellant’s evidence about where D was living, on grounds that it was contradictory, and accepted the Second Respondent’s evidence (that D was living with her mother, the Second Respondent). On the Appellant’s appeal to the Upper Tribunal, supported by the First Respondent, the Upper Tribunal finds that the First-tier Tribunal erred in law in not addressing the evidential implications of the Second Respondent’s evidence being untested (because she did not attend the hearing and so could not be questioned on it), as this potentially affected both its weighing of the competing evidence, and its determination of whether it continued to be in the interests of justice to proceed in the Second Respondent’s absence. There was no adequate explanation of how the First-tier Tribunal took this material circumstance into consideration. The Upper Tribunal sets the decision aside and remits the case for rehearing.