Elaina Bailes & Tom Otter chart the recent resurgence of representative actions post Lloyd v Google
- Representative actions now warrant serious consideration as a mechanism for bringing multi-party claims.
- They could assist investors in obtaining redress when it would not otherwise be realistically available to them, with a key Court of Appeal judgment expected next year.
- Reform is needed to the CPR to assist the courts, maximise the utility of representative actions for claimants as a recovery mechanism and to ensure England retains its position as a global centre for litigation.
Does England & Wales have an opt-out class action system? This seemingly straightforward question that often comes from foreign lawyers has a ‘yes and no’ answer; ‘yes we do, but only for some causes of action’.
This article considers one of the two existing procedural mechanisms for opt-out actions: representative actions permitted under rule 19.8 of the Civil Procedure Rules (the other being opt-out procedures in the Competition Appeal Tribunal).
In particular, we focus on
