Class action against RBS’s GRG to become multi-billion pound as numbers soar on leaked docs

RGL had recently set out its stall to launch a legal claim against RBS early next year on behalf of around 140 businesses following a publicity drive that had seen it add around 100 new claimants to its numbers.

Those firms already signed up are pursing claims on average of £6-7 million.

However, that is now expected to swell to more than 1,000 as a result of the data leak reported by the BBC and BuzzFeed News yesterday that appeared to prove claims long denied by still 73 per cent state-owned RBS that it deliberately set out to profit from its own business customers by forcing them to the wall then stripping them of their assets.

RGL, which is being funded by professional litigation investors, was formed in February this year claiming that Edinburgh-based RBS “systematically sought to defraud its customers for its own commercial purposes”.

RGL chief executive James Hayward said: “Many of the victims of GRG have claims that are time-barred. But those claims can be resurrected by virtue of RBS’s concealment of the true nature of GRG’s activities.

“It will be forcefully argued that insufficient knowledge was publicly available as to the truth of what happened until the 2013 publication of the Tomlinson report.

“Consequently, limitation ought not to run against these claims until six years from November 2013.

“Although heavy resistance from RBS is expected, there is reason for confidence. The allegations that will unfold in this litigation will be disturbing for the bank and will continue to cast a shadow over its attempts at reconciliation with its customer base.”

The class action will also claim GRG targeted “asset-rich” small to medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) on an “often invented” pretext to then “hit them with heavy fees, placed them into a manufactured insolvency process and then in many cases obtained their key assets at undervalued rates”.

Jon Pain, RBS’ chief conduct and regulatory affairs officer, told The Herald: “RBS has been very clear that GRG’s role was to protect the bank’s position, where possible by working with distressed businesses to return them to financial health.

“In the aftermath of the financial crisis we did not always meet our own high standards and we let some of our SME customers down.

“We have found no evidence that the bank either inappropriately targeted such businesses to transfer them to GRG or drove them to insolvency. Nor did it buy their assets at a lower than market price.”