Carmakers chose to cheat to sell cars rather than comply with emissions law, ‘dieselgate’ trial told
Car manufacturers decided they would rather cheat to prioritise “customer convenience” and sell cars than comply with the law on deadly pollutants, the first trial day of the largest group action in English legal history has been told.More than a decade after the original “dieselgate” scandal broke, lawyers representing 1.6 million diesel car owners in the UK argue that manufacturers deliberately installed software to rig emissions tests.They allege the “prohibited defeat devices” could detect when the cars were under test conditions and ensure that harmful NOx emissions were kept within legal limits, duping regulators and drivers.Should the claim be upheld, estimated damages could exceed £6bn.
The three-month hearing that opened at London’s high court on Monday will focus on vehicles sold by five manufacturers – Mercedes, Ford, Renault, Nissan and Peugeot/Citroën – from 2009.In “real world” conditions, when driven on the road, lawyers argue, the cars produced much higher levels of emissions.The judgment on the five lead defendants will also bind other manufacturers including Jaguar Land Rover, Vauxhall/Opel, Volkswagen/Porsche, BMW, FCA/Suzuki, Volvo, Hyundai-Kia, Toyota and Mazda, whose cases are not being heard to reduce the case time and costs.Opening the case for the claimants, Thomas de la Mare KC said: “Each player in the industry basically took a conscious decision that customer convenience, which helped the industry sell more cars, was more important than reducing pollutants causing death.”In written submissions, the claimants quoted a Centre for Research on Energy and Clean Air report that found excess NOx emissions had caused 124,000 premature deaths in the UK and Europe between 2009 and 2024.
De la Mare told the high court levels of emissions could have easily been reduced had vehicles had larger tanks for AdBlue – an additive that cuts NOx in diesel vehicles – and asked customers to refill them.Instead, he said: “They have basically said the concern about making these cars sellable by removing these inconveniences is so strong … that we would rather cheat than comply with the law.”The lead barrister also told the judge, Mrs Justice Cockerill, that manufacturers were trying to argue that numerous prior dieselgate rulings abroad, including in the US and European court of justice, did not apply to the UK.He said: “Our position is broadly that we will rely on foreign regulatory decisions as a matter of fact, rather than an opinion on law.”He said that the defendants’ argument meant that “mainland GB becomes a sort of defeat device Brexit Island … But Northern Ireland is applying case law that you’re being asked to put in the bin.
”Internal training and briefing documents from Ford in 2010 on defeat devices showed, he said, that: “The manufacturers could and did understand the law exactly as we do now,”Lawyers for the defendants will make opening statements later this week,The car manufacturers deny having used prohibited defeat devices,Sign up to Business TodayGet set for the working day – we'll point you to all the business news and analysis you need every morningafter newsletter promotionIn written submissions, lawyers for Renault, said the case was “riddled with errors and misunderstandings, especially about the design and operation of the vehicles’ emission control systems”, while Ford’s said it was “scientifically illiterate”,Mercedes said the claimants case was “obsessively focused” on NOx pollution rather than other emissions, and did not “acknowledge the complexity” of diesel engineering.
Lawyers for Nissan said the case’s central legal premise was “an untenably broad reading of defeat device”.The main trial, establishing the evidence, is expected to conclude before Christmas, with a break before legal arguments are heard in March 2026.A judgment is expected next summer, with a further trial for possible compensation following.Adam Kamenetzky, from south London, a lead claimant among the 1.6 million owners, told the Guardian outside court: “For the first time, certainly in the UK if not in any jurisdiction, the evidence is actually being made public.
“If these allegations are borne out, consumers were deceived at the point of sale, and there needs to be action taken to prevent this kind of deception being built into cars,”
The Guide #212: The Taylor Swift backlash has me asking: how much good music can one artist really produce?
Amid the flood of discourse around Taylor Swift’s The Life of a Showgirl, one recurring sentiment jumped out: that the album – which many critics have declared a misstep in Swift’s otherwise consistently solid discography – felt hurried, hasty, rushed. “The Life of a Showgirl Is 40 Minutes of Elevator Music Rushed Out to Break a Beatles Record”, read the particularly savage headline of a piece on Collider. In the Guardian music desk’s excellent round table on the album, just about every panellist expressed a wish that Swift would take a break from the constant churn of releasing records, in order to recapture a lost spark.And it has been quite the churn. Since 2019 Swift has on average released an album a year, and that’s not counting the Taylor’s Version re-records of her older albums
Seth Meyers on Trump: ‘deeply unhinged, detached from reality’
Late-night hosts have questioned Donald Trump’s cognitive abilities as he makes further blunders during his second term.On Late Night, Seth Meyers replayed clips of various rightwingers talking about Joe Biden’s cognitive decline when he was president and then told viewers that the same people should be more aware of Trump having similar issues.Recently, he repeated the debunked claim that he predicted Osama bin Laden would engage in mass terrorist activity one year before 9/11. Meyers played footage of him slurring a catalogue of errors to a crowd. “Finding the dementia in that clip is like finding Waldo in a book called Oops! All Waldos,” he said
Spitting Image comics decry lawsuit over depiction of Paddington Bear
A decision to sue the makers of Spitting Image over a depiction of Paddington Bear as a foul-mouthed drug addict is an attack on comedy and freedom of expression, the comedians behind the reinvention have said.StudioCanal, the production company that made the recent Paddington movies, is taking legal action against the team behind Spitting Image over the character’s reimagining as the co-host of a satirical podcast, The Rest is Bulls*!t.In a new YouTube video responding to the lawsuit, however, a dishevelled Paddington is again seen snorting cocaine and using StudioCanal’s legal letter as toilet paper. The video calls on viewers to “remember to like and subscribe before Paddington gets cancelled”.The online show featuring Paddington’s makeover is produced by Avalon, the makers of Spitting Image – the satirical TV puppet show that angered numerous politicians when it ran throughout the 1980s
Jimmy Kimmel on Trump’s national guard deployments: ‘Incredibly dangerous and unnecessary’
Late-night hosts assessed Donald Trump’s deployment of the national guard for nonexistent crises and government dysfunction amid the ongoing shutdown.Jimmy Kimmel took a moment to acknowledge his home base of Los Angeles on Wednesday. “We are safe, we are sound, thanks to our president who saved us from ourselves by calling in the national guard to stop a conflict that never started – but could have! Had he not acted to prevent an entirely fabricated crisis from spilling out of his imagination and on to our streets,” he said, referring to Trump’s deployment of the national guard in LA to prevent a nonexistent insurrection.“Thank you, Mr President,” he continued. “Thank you for sending troops to occupy all of these Democrat-run cities, whether we want them or not
Bill Burr calls critics of Riyadh comedy festival ‘sanctimonious’ and ‘phoney’
Bill Burr has defended his appearance at the controversial Riyadh comedy festival, calling his critics “sanctimonious cunts”.The comedian has been under fire, alongside Kevin Hart, Louis CK, Aziz Ansari and Dave Chappelle, for being on the lineup for what was billed as “the world’s largest comedy festival”. The Human Rights Watch called out the event as a distraction, aiming to focus on something light rather than the “soaring number of executions” taking place while comedians such as Marc Maron and Shane Gillis expressed disappointment. David Cross wrote that he was “disgusted” in a statement.Burr spoke to Conan O’Brien as part of a live podcast, and said he felt “wonderful” about his appearance and doesn’t “give a fuck what all these phoney fucking people are saying”
Jimmy Kimmel on Trump: ‘Why does he always sound like the dumbest member of the crime family?’
Late-night hosts discuss Donald Trump’s unhelpful comments on the ongoing government shutdown, Ghislaine Maxwell and Fox News being too “politically correct”.Jimmy Kimmel continued to keep tabs on the government shutdown on Tuesday evening, as essential workers such as air traffic controllers were still required to work without pay. “Meanwhile Congress, the people who actually shut the government down, are getting paid in full,” he said. “Don’t even try to make sense of it. The logic doesn’t fly, and I would recommend that you don’t either, at least for quite awhile
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