Japanese shipping companies MOL and NYK have reached an agreement in Britain to pay a total settlement of £54 million (€61.5 million). The sum is in lieu of their participation in an international car carrier cartel between October 2006 and September 2015. The announcement was made by Mark McLaren, the British consumer champion who, in collaboration with the law firm Scott+Scott, has spent years fighting for redress.
Although the settlement was proposed warmer this year, a hearing is due in less than a month to ratify the outcome. According to McLaren, the car carrier cartel transported a total of seventeen million new cars and other vehicles from manufacturers such as Volkswagen, BMW, Mercedes-Benz, Nissan, Toyota, and Ford at inflated prices. McLaren and Scott+Scott call it a “historic settlement” that will finally allow affected customers to be compensated.
Other agreements reached
Last January, a settlement was reached with the Japanese shipping company, styled “K” Line, and Wallenius Wilhelmsen Logistics (WWL), as well as the European operation of Korean carrier Eukor. In 2023, a similar settlement was reached with CSAV of Chile. This brings the total to £92.75 million (€105 million). This is considerably less than the £150 million McLaren had initially targeted at the start of the process. The settlement now reached with MOL and NYK still needs to be ratified by the UK Competition Appeal Tribunal in mid-January (on the 15th, with a half day in reserve on 16 January). The Tribunal normally sits in the City of London.
“Since I launched this case five years ago, I was confident that this claim would result in significant damages being awarded to UK consumers and businesses,” said Mark McLaren, who has pursued this action professionally, through his company formed for the task (Mark McLaren Class Representative Limited) having given up his decade-long career at the independent British consumer watchdog Which? “I am pleased that this historic settlement agreement not only resolves wrongful anti-competitive, cartelist actions, but also allows for class members to finally be compensated for their financial losses. This outcome also shows how the UK’s opt-out regime is working exactly as intended, giving both consumers and businesses an effective and fair route to recover monies owed as a result of cartel behaviour that they could never pursue on their own.”
Exoneration for collaboration
The car carrier cartel is a historic transgression, for which the shipping companies involved have been paying the price for years. Two years ago, for example, fines were imposed in Canada, and five years ago in Australia. The EU, the US, and Mexico had already imposed fines on the car carriers involved.
It is notable that MOL, which has now reached a multi-million dollar settlement in the UK, escaped prosecution in 2018 when cartel fines were imposed in the EU. Because MOL had fully cooperated with the European Commission’s investigation at the time, it was exonerated, and the entire European bill fell to the other cartel members, “K” Line, NYK, WWL-Eukor, and CSAV.
Adapted from original reporting by Paul Jumelet for our Dutch-language sister publication, Nieuwsblad Transport. Additional material by WCN.