Car owners line up to claim against VW as diesel emissions scandal hits the UK

Slater and Gordon has revealed that 500 car owners want to claim against VW. The news comes as the German manufacturer has admitted that almost 1.2 million of its vehicles could be affected by the diesel emissions scandal.

The firm says that motorists believe they were misled by Volkswagen over its diesel emissions after the company admitted it used special devices to cheat tests.

VW now said that there are 1,189,906 of its UK vehicles involved in the cheating. These break down as 508,276 Volkswagen passenger cars, 393,450 Audi models, 76,773 SEAT vehicles, 131,569 Skoda cars and 79,838 Volkswagen Commercial Vehicles.

Slater and Gordon head of group litigation Jacqueline Young said: “More than 500 people have contacted Slater and Gordon in the past two and a half days to register their interest in signing up to a group action against Volkswagen.

“On Monday morning our website was receiving two enquiries a minute from people trying to register with us for more information.

“The level of outrage among ordinary people is unprecedented. It’s understandable that diesel car owners want to stay up to date on this scandal.

“We are calling on Volkswagen to urgently provide clarity on exactly the extent of the problem. We seek confirmation of which models and makes are affected by this scandal and to what extent. Were defeat devices installed across the board and if not, what selection criteria was used?

She added that VW also needed to come clean about how long the practice had been on-going and who within the executive authorised or condoned this practice.

“Trust in the VW brand has all but been eroded, but now is the time for the company to urgently provide clarity on these issues which impact large numbers of the UK public who have been completely misled,” she added.

Mark Dugdale