Law firm Leigh Day, which is also seeking similar legal claims against Mercedes and investigating potential legal actions against many other vehicle manufacturers over cheat devices, said that the April ruling was a significant hurdle in establishing liability for the group of around 91,000 UK drivers who brought the legal action. 

In the judgment handed down on 6 April 2020 Mr Justice Waksman described some of Volkswagen's arguments that the vehicles did not contain defeat device as "completely irrelevant" [154], "hopeless" [172] and "highly flawed" [220]. The judge described VW's argument that the German transport authority's decision as to the existence of the defeat device was not binding as "an abuse of process" [421].

Law firm Leigh Day were appointed joint lead solicitors in the case with Slater & Gordon. 

Shazia Yamin, solicitor from law firm Leigh Day, said:

"Today's decision not to allow Volkswagen to appeal the High Court ruling is hugely significant and we are delighted that it makes clear that the initial decision in this case was 'clearly correct'. The legal action against Volkswagen can now proceed and it also blackens the clouds over the headquarters of many other vehicle manufacturers who may have felt that cheating the system was good for business.

"We believe that drivers in this country are owed many millions, if not billions, of pounds after they were mis-sold cars which had far greater emissions than they were led to believe, causing much more harm to the environment and increasing fuel consumption.

"Volkswagen should now accept the court's decision and we urge them to now do the right thing and put their customers first by entering into settlement negotiations so that our clients are not forced to drag them further through the courts."