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CONSUMER ADR and COLLECTIVE REDRESS Professor Dr Christopher Hodges Head of the CMS Research Programme on Civil Justice Systems Centre for Socio-Legal Studies, University of Oxford Life Member, Wolfson College, Oxford Erasmus Professor of the Fundamentals of Private Law
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CONSUMER ADR and COLLECTIVE REDRESS Professor Dr Christopher Hodges Head of the CMS Research Programme on Civil Justice Systems Centre for Socio-Legal Studies, University of Oxford Life Member, Wolfson College, Oxford Erasmus Professor of the Fundamentals of Private Law Erasmus University, Rotterdam
Collective Redress Problem: How to deal with mass problems? Fact: The most familiar technique within civil procedure is the U.S. class action
Starting From Scratch • What is architecture of the legal system? • Is it the same in different parts of the world? • Public and Private Enforcement: different models in U.S. and EU • Enforcement Policy: deterrence, risk, responsive…
Private Enforcement – of private rights and public norms • Encourage everyone to enforce • Align substantive law • Remove economic and technical barriers • Insert economic incentives
Features of private enforcement: deterrence policy • No cost to P • No loser pays rule • One-way cost shifting rule • High/triple damages • High fees for intermediaries • Wide discovery and depositions • Punitive damages • Jury trials • Aggregation of individual claims • No regulatory pre-emption
Features of private enforcement: class actions • Ban on class procedure if alternatives • Restriction to certified personnel • Certification criteria • Evaluation of merits • Certification by court • Opt-in or opt-out • Notice to class members • Court approval of settlement • Court approval of lawyers’ fees • Stand-alone or follow-on
EU Events • 2008 14 MSs have collective rules: mostly little used • Consultation on Benchmarks • Several Studies • Competition Damages: ECJ, DG COMP • Collective actions →Collective redress + ADR • 2010 Consultations on CR and ADR • 2011 Principles? Safeguards?
Issues • Constitutional and fundamental rights problem with determination of individual rights when the owner is not involved, eg opt-out • Principles of subsidiarity, procedural autonomy, proportionality
Issues with Private Enforcement • Financial incentives or barriers (safeguards) • eg loser pays • contingency fees, third party funding, trip[le damages • Technical barriers • eg opt-in v opt-out • certification • Court approval of settlement • The problem: inability to calibrate the level of enforcement/abuse
What are we trying to do?First principles • Set standards of behaviour • Prevent things going wrong (infringement) • Put things right (restoration)
Three Pillar Model Regulation ADR Private Litigation
The New Integrated Model • Voluntary Settlement – ADR encourage specific schemes, negotiation, mediation, ombudsmen • Regulatory Oversight of Restitution Danish Consumer Ombudsman: residual powers to arrange collective redress, or UK targeted responsive enforcement policy, plus restorative justice • Judicial Procedure last resort, so not expansive, generally opt-in