Take-up of GLOs has been modest, which many commentators attribute to the lack of an opt-out system. A list of GLOs is published on the English courts website. GLOs have been issued in a range of areas, including product liability, personal injury, tax and insurance. Judgment on one or more of the GLO issues then binds all of the claimants on the group register – any non-GLO issues (such as individual levels of compensation) will be determined in each individual case. A GLO will not be permitted if the court considers it more appropriate that the claims are consolidated or for there to be a "representative action" (see below). they must "opt in") by a date specified by the court.
The claims are brought as a group, usually with at least ten claimants and often using the same lawyers.Īll claimants wishing to join the group litigation must apply to be entered on the group register (i.e. A GLO is made under CPR 19 for claims which "give rise to common or related issues of fact or law" (otherwise known as GLO issues). GLOs were introduced as part of the new English civil procedural rules introduced in April 1999 (the CPR), although they had been in existence on a more informal basis for some time. The significance of this is explored below. While any claims brought in the English courts can still only be brought on an opt-in basis, collective actions for damages for infringement of competition law can be brought on an opt-out basis in the Competition Appeal Tribunal (CAT). This contrasts with an opt-out regime, whereby an action can be pursued on behalf of a class of unnamed, and even unidentified, claimants who are deemed included in the action unless they have specifically opted out. As such, claimants must elect to join the action in order to be considered a member of the class and share in any damages recovered. Until October 2015 these mechanisms all shared a common feature: they operated on an opt-in basis. The English court rules provide various procedural mechanisms for these collective actions, and these are listed below. The potential for collective actions arises whenever an alleged wrong causes loss to a group of people in a similar way.
#COLLECTIVE ACTION DRIVERS#
It concludes with a look at current trends, in particular the hotspots for collective actions and the drivers behind the perceived increase in collective actions. This guide provides an overview of the various mechanisms currently available in the English courts for collective actions. These, together with other procedural and substantive features available to litigants in the English courts, may explain why England is conventionally regarded as fertile ground for collective claims. The English courts have various types of procedures for collective litigation, and recent reforms have added to these with new procedures available for collective consumer and competition claims. This guide explains the mechanisms available in the English courts for bringing collective actions and goes on to look at the status of current initiatives that are focusing on collective actions.Ĭollective actions, or "class actions", are where multiple claimants with claims sharing common characteristics seek a remedy against the same defendant or multiple defendants. Restructuring, Special Situations and Insolvency.Antitrust, Regulation and Foreign Investment.
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