Brattle Client Road Haulage Association Cleared to Bring Opt-In Class Action Against Major Truck Manufacturers
The UK Competition Appeal Tribunal (CAT) has granted the Road Haulage Association (RHA), a commercial trucking trade group and a Brattle client, its Collective Proceedings Order (CPO) application in the case Road Haulage Association Limited v Man SE and others.
The Tribunal’s June 8, 2022 ruling – the first granting of an opt-in CPO in the UK, which gives potential class members the option to choose to join a collective action – enables the RHA to pursue a collective claim for damages against truck manufacturers. This follows on from the European Commission’s earlier decision that these truck manufacturers infringed Article 101 of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union (TFEU) due to alleged price fixing between 1997 and 2011.
Dr. Peter Davis, Brattle Principal and Leader of the firm’s European Antitrust & Competition practice, has been instructed by the RHA to assist in quantifying damages suffered by members of the class. The CAT’s judgment considered Dr. Davis’ proposed common methodology for quantifying damages, noting that his methodology contrasted sharply with that of the expert instructed by the second applicant, UK Trucks Claim Limited.
Ultimately, the CAT concluded that it “feel[s] more confidence in the robustness of the method proposed by Dr. Davis.” In doing so, it found that Dr. Davis provided “very helpful” oral evidence, and described that the Tribunal was “impressed by Dr. Davis’ explanation of his methodology and his professional ingenuity in devising tests for actual and possible issues.”
Dr. Davis and the Brattle team are working on the case with RHA’s legal representatives, including Director Steven Meyerhoff and Associate Director James Lomax of Backhouse Jones and Addleshaw Goddard Partners Mark Molyneux, Bruce Kilpatrick, and Samantha Haigh. Counsel are James Flynn QC and Emma Mockford of Brick Court Chambers and David Went of Exchange Chambers.
The CAT’s judgment on the CPO application is available here.
