Automotive

A class action against Toyota Finance has argued it can add new claims that are out of time because Victorian courts cannot factor in the loss of limitations defences in deciding whether to allow amendments. 

A judge has ordered Honda to pay $13.6 million in damages to dealer Brighton Automotive in a suit over the car maker’s move away from a dealership model. 

Toyota has denied a class action’s claims that devices installed in its vehicles were intended to cheat emissions tests, maintaining that they were designed to protect engines from damage.

A law firm is challenging an order that it pay $5.4 million in a class action against Macquarie Leasing as security for the lender’s costs, saying concerns about its borrowing capacity were “theoretical and speculative.”

Dealer Brighton Automative is gunning for $13.9 million in damages after Honda cut its contract off prematurely, with Honda hopeful the figure is more like $12.1 million. 

Landmark High Court decisions in class actions against Toyota and Ford on how damages should be calculated for defective vehicles will spark more consumer class actions, a plaintiff lawyer told Lawyerly.

The High Court has upheld appeals in class actions against Ford and Toyota over the calculation of damages for reduction in value of defective vehicles.

Isuzu is not giving up its bid to slam the brakes on a suit by car alarm company Directed Electronics over alleged trade secrets theft.

Expert evidence is not meant to “provide a judge with comfort”, a judge has found in rejecting evidence from two experts in flex commissions class actions against Westpac and Macquarie.

Vehicle maker Isuzu can’t shut down an $18 million suit by car alarm company Directed Electronics over a former employee’s alleged theft of trade secrets.