[2025] EWHC 2307 (KB)

The claimants’ attempts to provide more detail to justify a more generous approach has, in fact, only served to demonstrate the “wildly inefficient” approach criticised in the first CMH judgment. We say this having made allowance for the fact that the claimants’ management costs will inevitably be higher than those of the individual defendants.

The work here runs from April 2026 until December 2026, a period of nine months and during which the Group Registers are closed and the case runs up to the Quantum Trial. The defendants have assumed that there will be very little GLO management work, given the closure of the Registers; that there will be no GLO hearings and there will be very little correspondence between claimants and defendants. We think these are reasonable assumptions which apply to both sides. In particular, we did not think that updating the Group Registers during this period should cause any significant amount of work.

However, the claimants’ assumptions expect there to be monthly updates, often both in writing and in meetings from the Lead Solicitors, to a panoply of other lawyers and non-lawyers – the Steering Committees, the Claimant Solicitors’ Committee, the Claimant Committee – who, at least as far as the lawyers are concerned, have inevitably also claimed their time for attending meetings and dealing with these updates. The attempt to estimate amounts for each element identified has resulted in an approach where overlapping elements are taken entirely separately, with a consequent inflation of costs. The composite results are frankly staggering. The purpose of having Lead Solicitors is for them to carry out the legal work in an efficient and cost effective manner to bring the issues before the court. Here there are forty or fifty Sample Claimants out of 1.8 million claimants. Yet the impression is given that all 1.8 million needed to be updated on a monthly basis in relation to (necessarily fairly granular) issues that have arisen during the previous month.

If this level of communication between solicitors at the various levels on the claimants’ side (as well as their clients) is considered necessary by them, then they will need to make a contribution to those communications. They are far beyond what is reasonable and proportionate in this litigation. There appears to be no attempt to provide an update that could be used by all in some cost effective manner. We have made some allowance for communications with the Steering Committee in the three affected GLOs, given their involvement under the terms of the GLOs, and notwithstanding time also allowed in the non-phase specific co-ordination costs in the Tranche 3 budget. But otherwise, we have only allowed sums for a modest updating of the Group Registers and updating of the wider claimant community, including the lawyers.

As far as the defendants are concerned, all but PCD and Vauxhall’s budgets have been agreed. All of the defendants’ budgets are considerably below the sums allowed to them in Tranche 2.

PCD have assumed that there will be significant co-ordination in their assumptions. We do not agree with that categorisation and as such think that even the counter proposal of £180,000 – which is twice the agreed figures of any other ALGLO – is too high. Indeed, the Lead and ALGLO defendants, other than PCD, have coalesced around similar figures and we consider PCD’s reasonable budget for this phase should be in line with them, particularly as much of the work that is required appears to involve inter defendant co-ordination.

In respect of Vauxhall, we reiterate the point made above concerning the Steering Committee in its GLO. We note that BMW (who also have a Steering Committee) have an agreed overall figure of £53,704.00 (including the Dealerships). That suggests Vauxhall’s counter proposal of £55,000 is a reasonable and proportionate figure and we have allowed it as such.