Duncan Lewis Solicitors

Public Law

Sulaiha Ali is a solicitor and supervisor within the public law department at Duncan Lewis. She specialises in a wide range of immigration related judicial review matters, with a particular interest in refugee law and immigration detention.

Her extensive experience in the First-tier and Upper Tribunal of the Immigration Asylum Chamber as well as the County Court, Administrative Court and Court of Appeal, means Sulaiha regularly litigates across a broad range of areas and conducts high profile challenges to unlawful policies and practices affecting vulnerable people. She is dedicated to providing representation to those who are most in need and the majority of her work is carried out under legal aid.

Whilst she is committed to challenging the Secretary of State's unlawful actions by way of judicial review, Sulaiha remains heavily involved with her clients' underlying asylum and protection based claims and is driven to achieve successful outcomes.

She has been involved in cases that have generated significant media exposure including her challenge to the SSHD’s refusal to return a deported individual to the UK in the wake of their ‘deport now, appeal later’ policy. The case R (on the application of Watson) v SSHD was the first successful one of its kind. Sulaiha’s work on this matter resulted in her being named The Times’ ‘Lawyer of the Week’.

Having joined Duncan Lewis as a caseworker in 2011 before training as a solicitor, she then moved into the role of supervisor.

Sulaiha has a Level 2 Senior Caseworker accreditation under the Law Society's Immigration and Asylum Accreditation Scheme (IAAS).

She received her LLB from the University of Reading before completing her LPC and qualifying as a solicitor in 2014.