Health & Beauty
New dieselgate case in High Court
Nearly 7m diesel vehicles in the UK may be using illegal defeat devices.
13 October 2025
Main image: Still from Mums for Lungs short film ‘What do you want your kids to breathe?’
This afternoon, 11 years after the Dieselgate scandal first broke, the High Court is due to hand down a landmark judgment in the UK’s largest-ever group legal action.
It will decide whether major car manufacturers fitted diesel vehicles with illegal defeat devices that enabled them to pass emissions tests while emitting far higher levels of toxic pollution on the road.
Ahead of the judgment, campaign group Mums for Lungs has released new analysis revealing that more than 7 million of the UK’s dirtiest diesel cars remain on the road, emitting an estimated 48,700 tonnes of excess NOx every year above legal limits.
These excess emissions have contributed to more than 30,000 children developing asthma in the UK.
To mark the moment, Mums for Lungs has launched a short film, What do you want your kids to breathe?, showing children smoking ‘diesel vapes’ made from miniature exhaust pipes. It’s a stark visual metaphor for the toxic air many children continue to breathe every day.
Campaigners are calling on the government and manufacturers to work together to remove every one of these high-polluting vehicles from UK roads, impose meaningful regulatory penalties and finally deliver accountability for one of the biggest environmental scandals in automotive history.
The judgment in the Pan-NOx Group Litigation is expected on Friday 10 July at 14.00. The case, heard between October 2025 and March 2026, involves more than 1.6 million claimants bringing claims against Mercedes-Benz, Ford, Renault/Nissan and Peugeot-Citroën (Stellantis). Damages could exceed £6 billion.
Almost 11 years have passed since it emerged that Volkswagen had installed software designed to cheat emissions tests, allowing some diesel vehicles to emit up to 40 times the legal limit of nitrogen oxides during normal driving.
Despite Dieselgate triggering criminal prosecutions, multi-billion-dollar penalties and prison sentences overseas, campaigners say the UK has failed to hold manufacturers to account.
Unlike the United States and Germany, the UK has seen no criminal prosecutions, no executive jailed and no comparable regulatory fines. Meanwhile, the government’s investigation into emissions compliance across 110 vehicle models only formally began in 2025 and has yet to publish its findings.
‘It’s truly shocking how long this scandal has been allowed to go on in the UK – manufacturers building devices to defeat emissions testing, selling highly polluting cars to customers, and – here’s the bottom line – pumping out toxic emissions.
‘The impact of this is felt in every NHS clinic in the UK, and in the homes of families like mine which are affected by lung problems such as asthma. We now need to see these vehicles coming off the road.’
DR BETH WAN
NHS resident doctor and mother of two young children, North London
Today, 7.1 million Euro 5 and Euro 6 (a-c) diesel vehicles remain on UK roads, continuing to emit harmful pollution while air pollution contributes to tens of thousands of premature deaths every year.
Legal documents filed by manufacturers ahead of the trial were initially heavily redacted. In March 2025, Mums for Lungs challenged the secrecy by writing an open letter to the judge, backed by more than 650 individuals, MPs and over 50 charities, and demonstrated outside the Royal Courts of Justice calling for transparency.
Last June, alongside environmental law charity ClientEarth, Mums for Lungs formally applied to have the redactions lifted. In July, the High Court granted the application in full, ensuring the landmark case was heard in public rather than behind closed doors.
‘For more than a decade, families have been left breathing the consequences of one of the biggest corporate scandals in automotive history.
‘Millions of diesel cars are still pumping out illegal levels of toxic pollution, and the price has been paid by children. 30,000 children have developed asthma linked to these excess emissions. Every day these vehicles stay on the road is another day children are forced to breathe dirty air, risking their lives.
‘The government cannot keep looking the other way. These toxic diesel cars should be recalled, manufacturers must be held accountable, and children’s lungs must come before corporate profits.
‘Behind every statistic is a child struggling to breathe. Parents should not have to watch their children wheeze their way through school, sport or even a walk to the shops because companies cheated emissions tests.
‘Other countries acted. Executives faced justice, manufacturers paid billions, and dirty vehicles were taken off the roads. In the UK, we’ve had delay after delay while millions of polluting cars remain in use. It is time for ministers to stop dragging their feet and put public health first.’
JEMIMA HARTSHORN
Founder and director of Mums for Lungs
The campaign film, produced by creative studio Dog Cat & Mouse, contrasts the decisive action taken in the United States and Germany with the UK’s slower response, highlighting what campaigners describe as ‘a generation of children growing up breathing excess diesel pollution’.
The judgment will cover England and Wales, and there are separate proceedings in Scotland.
Nearly 7m diesel vehicles in the UK may be using illegal defeat devices.
Diesel emissions breaches in half a million Vauxhall vehicles – one million drivers could be compensated up to £20k each.
Supermarket-branded tankers caught filling up at oil terminal known to import Russian diesel.
Electric cars can be half as cheap to run as petrol or diesel vehicles, new fuel cost tracker reveals.
