The Supreme Court rules that owners of Toyota and Ford can appeal a damages case for defective vehicles

More than 300,000 angry Toyota and Ford owners who bought defective cars over the past decade will have to wait even longer for compensation after a ruling by Australia’s High Court in Canberra today.

Cars affected included Toyota Hiluxes, Prados and Fortunas with diesel engines, and Ford Focus, Fiesta and Ecosport models with a problem with the dry dual-clutch transmission.

Both cases were first brought to the Federal Court as a class action seeking a ruling on how to resolve the car’s loss of value once solutions for the defective vehicles had been developed.

The main issue concerned the guarantee in Australian Consumer Law that an item purchased should be of acceptable quality.

In a case like this where the cars were defective, the law says that consumers are entitled to compensation for the loss of value.

The sticking point the Supreme Court considered was at what point that loss of value should be calculated.

Today the Supreme Court answered that question by saying that the assessment of damages is “the amount by which the value of the goods is reduced at the time of delivery.”

All three cases, including a class action by Toyota owners, a cross-claim by Toyota and a class action by Ford owners, have been sent back to the Federal Court to be re-examined in light of the Supreme Court ruling.

Filters blew out harmful gas

It’s been a long road for the car owners and the two car companies.

In Toyota’s case, the particulate filters were supposed to capture dangerous pollutants, but instead blew out harmful gas.

It was only when the so-called “2020 field fix” was developed that a solution was found and the company provided free repairs.

Ford also had difficulty solving the problems with the dry dual-clutch transmission, which led to sudden deceleration, intermittent revving and loss of power.

The faults were intermittent and some cars had some problems, some had all the problems and some had no problems at all.

When the problems first came to light in 2015, Ford told customers the shuddering was a result of their driving style.

The ACCC fined the company $10 million after Ford admitted unconscionable conduct.

The line between compensation and overcompensation

The current case was never a question of whether compensation should be paid, but rather where the line should be drawn.

In the case of Toyota, the Federal Court found that the loss of value of the cars was 17.5 percent, rejecting the company’s argument that this should be less due to the availability of the solution from 2020.

On appeal, the court ruled that the loss of value before the repair was only 10 percent.

The Federal Court judge in the Ford case initially ruled that the depreciation was 30 percent.

But when Ford challenged that, the Court of Appeal found that the judge had not taken into account free repairs to the car, the value of the car at the time of the trial and the use of the car.

In both cases the High Court was asked to rule on where the line was drawn between compensation and overcompensation.

It found that none of the Federal Court decisions addressed the issue on the basis of measuring loss at the point of delivery.