Automotive

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.

A collectable car dealer who operated his Gosford business using a ‘museum concept’ has won a High Court victory in a dispute with the ATO over whether he should be on the hook for luxury car tax.

Jaguar Land Rover has hit back at a class action alleging it misled drivers of cars fitted with allegedly defective diesel particulate filters, saying the “wear and tear” of car parts is to be expected.

A class action against ANZ over alleged predatory lending practices has settled for $85 million, while two related cases against Westpac and Macquarie are set to go to trial this month.  

A disputes partner has departed Gilbert + Tobin, taking with him two high-stakes class actions against Toyota and Jaguar over alleged diesel filter defects and the firm says it will not focus on bringing more class actions.

Hyundai and Kia have been ordered to produce further documents to allow a class action to investigate the nature and extent of alleged engine defects, with a judge rejecting the car makers’ bid to produce only a sample set of documents.

A judge has criticised the pleadings in class actions against ANZ, Macquarie and Westpac over flexible commission schemes for car dealers, saying they were “inappropriate and unhelpful” in referring to documents in the banking royal commission. 

Isuzu is the latest car maker to be stung with a class action for allegedly using defeat devices to cheat on emissions tests, and many more car makers may find themselves in the crosshairs over the “common practice”.

General Motors has failed to overturn a decision that put it on the hook for the applicant’s full costs in a partial settlement in a class action on behalf of Holden dealers, with an appeals court finding GM could not “walk away” from the ordinary meaning of the phrase ‘the plaintiff’s costs of the proceedings’.