Illogicality vs extreme illogicality

Federal Court. Does a judicial review applicant claiming illogicality in the decision of an administrative decision-maker need to show "extreme illogicality"? Can it be said that "inviting an applicant for a protection visa to speculate on the motivations, reasons or circumstances of a third party in the applicant’s country of nationality may be unlikely to produce probative material"?

Some of the questions to the Federal Court (FCA) were as follows:

Question 1: In the context of judicial review involving illogicality or irrationality on the part of an administrative decision-maker, the courts have often stated that "extreme illogicality" must be shown. Can it be said that "extreme" is "a description of the relevant error as it emerges from SZMDS rather than a separate element that must be established"? In other words, can it be said that "extreme" is "a description of the result that a court would arrive at having employed the test from SZMDS and found that it was satisfied"?

Question 2: Can it be said that, although illogicality and irrationality can arise in respect of a decision maker’s ultimate conclusion or in respect of the decision itself, it can "also arise in respect of subsidiary findings or reasoning leading to that conclusion, albeit that the overarching question is whether the decision itself is affected by jurisdictional error"?

Question 3: Can it be said that "inviting an applicant for a protection visa to speculate on the motivations, reasons or circumstances of a third party in the applicant’s country of nationality may be unlikely to produce probative material"?

Question 4: Can it be said that "seeking to contrast that invited speculation against speculation of the Tribunal itself in order to reach findings constitutes no more than conjecture on the part of the Tribunal"?

Question 5: Was it necessary for the applicant to show that the Tribunal's illogicality was material to the decision in question in order for such an error to be considered jurisdictional?

The FCA answered those questions as follows:

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