100,000 Scots could be in line for payout in ‘Dieselgate’ claim
MORE than 100,000 Scots who bought or leased diesel vehicles with unlawful equipment could be in line for compensation.
The Volkswagen Group announced in June it has reached an out-of-court settlement south of the Border over the Dieselgate scandal.
The German auto giant will pay £193million to the 91,000 motorists represented by law firms in the class action, which was the biggest to be brought before the English courts.
It came after the High Court ruled that emissions-testing software fitted to cars with the diesel engine had been designed to cheat emissions testing regimes, and amounted to unlawful ‘defeat devices’.
The group action represented buyers in England and Wales of Volkswagen Group cars – including Audis, Seats and Skodas – with the EA189 diesel engine, which was found in September 2015 to emit more of the air pollutant nitrogen dioxide than the company claimed.
Now lawyers are calling for Scots who may be affected to check if they are eligible to claim against manufacturers.
Stuart Cochran of law firm Slater and Gordon Scotland said: ‘We are urging any driver who feels they may be impacted to check their eligibility to a claim by visiting our claims portal.
‘The case has been reinforced by statements made by the Advocate General at the European Court of Justice in June 2022 which said that a manufacturer who has fitted an illegal defeat device in a vehicle should pay compensation to the consumer.
‘We believe that other manufacturers have fitted illegal defeat devices in their diesel vehicles. We are actively encouraging members of the public who have bought diesel vehicles from the specific manufacturers to join our claim.’
It is estimated that more than 100,000 drivers in Scotland could be eligible for compensation. The original English group action, which was launched in 2019, has been spearheaded by Slater and Gordon, Leigh Day and PGMBM and reached the High Court in December last year for a five-day hearing. It was launched after the German car-maker had originally refused to compensate owners of affected diesel models in the UK citing EU law.
The group action argued that dealerships had misled consumers during the purchase process as nitrogen dioxide levels were lowered under the lab conditions.
Last month the Volkswagen Group, which has already spent some £25billion globally on legal costs, compensation and vehicle buybacks since the Dieselgate scandal broke, said an out-ofcourt settlement with UK drivers was ‘the most prudent course of action commercially’.
‘Dieselgate’ began in 2015 when the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) found that many Volkswagen cars in America had computer software which could sense when the car was being tested.
They found that when in test conditions the ‘defeat device’ appeared to lower the vehicle’s engine power and performance.
But the EPA said when the vehicle ran normally engines emitted nitrogen oxide pollutants up to 40 times above the legal limit.
‘Fitted illegal defeat devices’