“This decision by the ECJ will trigger further mass lawsuits once morest diesel manufacturers,” says consumer advocates Peter Kolba. The European Court of Justice (ECJ) lowers the hurdles for claims for damages by diesel vehicle buyers in the event of inadmissible exhaust technology. The car manufacturers might also be liable if they had simply acted negligently without any intention of fraud, the Luxembourg judges ruled in a Mercedes case on Tuesday.
This will have a major impact on German and Austrian case law. Because at the Federal Court of Justice (BGH) plaintiffs only had a chance of compensation if they were deliberately and intentionally deceived by the manufacturer in an immoral way. These strict criteria were only at VW scandal engine EA189 Fulfills. Negligent action is now sufficient for the ECJ – which is easier to prove.
The judges in Germany and Austria must now implement these requirements. regarding that ECJ rulingl to be seen, courts of all instances had shelved masses of diesel proceedings in which this question is important. At the Federal Court of Justice alone, more than 1,900 appeals and complaints regarding non-admission are currently pending, the clear majority of which have been postponed because of the ECJ proceedings.
The “Diesel SenateThe BGH has already scheduled a hearing for May 8, in which it intends to discuss the “possible consequences for German liability law” in order to provide the lower instances with guidelines as quickly as possible. Because with the ECJ judgment not all questions have been clarified by a long shot. For example, it is unclear how much money affected car buyers are entitled to.
The background to the procedure was Claim for Damages from Germany once morest Mercedes-Benz because of a so-called thermal window. Thermal windows are part of the engine control system, which throttle exhaust gas cleaning at cooler temperatures. Car manufacturers argue that this is necessary to protect the engine. Environmental organizations, on the other hand, see it as a tool that helps to make car emissions appear smaller under test conditions than they are in real traffic. The ECJ considers these thermal windows to be permissible only within very narrow limits.
