ECJ lowers hurdles for damage claims

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The European Court of Justice (CJEU) lowers the threshold for claims for damages from diesel buyers in the event of impermissible exhaust technology. The car manufacturers could also be liable if they had simply acted negligently without any intent to commit fraud, Luxembourg judges ruled in a Mercedes case on Tuesday.

This can have major consequences for German jurisprudence. Because plaintiffs in the Federal Court of Justice (BGH) only had a chance of getting damages if they were deliberately and intentionally misled by the manufacturer in an immoral way. These strict criteria were met only with the VW scandal engine EA189. Negligence is now sufficient for the ECJ – that is easier to prove.

The judges in Germany must now implement these demands. Courts of all instances had suspended massive diesel proceedings in which this question was relevant pending the ECJ ruling. The BGH alone is dealing with more than 1,900 reviews and non-admission complaints, the vast majority of which were postponed due to the ECJ procedure.

The BGH’s “Diesel Senate” has already scheduled a hearing for May 8, in which it wants to discuss the “possible consequences for German liability law” in order to provide the lower authorities with guidance as soon as possible. Because with the judgment of the ECJ, not all questions have been clarified. For example, it is unclear how much money affected car buyers are entitled to.

The background to the proceedings was a claim for damages by Germany against Mercedes-Benz for a so-called thermal window. Thermal windows are part of the engine control system, which limits exhaust gas cleaning at lower temperatures. Car manufacturers state that this is necessary to protect the engine.

Environmental organizations, on the other hand, see it as a tool that helps to make the emissions of cars appear smaller under test conditions than in real traffic. The Court of Justice considers these thermal windows to be permissible only within very narrow limits.

Other manufacturers also used thermal windows as standard. Since the ruling of the Court of Justice concerns illegal defeat devices in general, it could also be transferable to other functionalities in diesel car exhaust technology, which are currently under judicial review. (SDA)

Source: Blick