RBS class action group looks to swell ranks with UK roadshow

RGL has already accumulated a sizable war chest for its legal campaign but it is now offering businesses with a grievance not already signed-up or part of the other group bring a similar action, RBS-GRG Business Action Group, to join their drive for compensation.

The RBS-GRG Business Action Group which was launched two years ago by former software executive Neil Mitchell, and is believed itself to have 300 viable claims.

Both groups are headed by experienced professionals with a full legal team working on a success fee basis.

The dual actions also come as the bank is also facing a £1.2bn litigation by the RBS Shareholder Action Group over its 2008 rights issue.

The two GRG challenge groups say they hope claims against RBS could reach £1billion or more, and RGL is now launching a UK roadshow with a meeting on Thursday in Edinburgh to swell its ranks.

RGL’s chief executive, James Hayward, a lawyer and investment banker, said: “We are keen to get the message out that all they have to do is register, there is no cost. We have already processed our first 100 claimants, we are fully funded and are in a position to go to court when we choose to.

“If we are successful, a percentage of the money we recover will be taken by the group to pay costs and legal fees.”

He said business losses ranged from “singledigit millions to in excess of £50m”.

Allegations against the bank include dishonesty and an unlawful means conspiracy.

A report commissioned by former business secretary Vince Cable and headed by entrepreneur Dr Lawrence Tomlinson in 2014, saw RBS’s GRG and its property offshoot West Register investigated over accusations of the sabotaging of customers by engineering breaches of loan agreements, then pulling lending and grabbing company assets.

A review commissioned by RBS from its legal advisers Clifford Chance, in response to the Tomlinson report, found “no evidence the bank had systematically defrauded customers”.

RBS subsequently cancelled all Mr Tomlinson’s accounts with the bank and threatened to sue him.

The FCA was due to publish a report on the GRG, disbanded in 2015, by the end of last year, but it has been delayed due to being reviewed by the bank.

Mr Hayward, who RGL’s website says has “run many large, complicated, multi-party, commercial actions and been involved in the litigation funding industry”, said the bank’s review is “wholly inappropriate” and likely to produce a “deeply flawed” report.

Those claims have been dismissed by the FCA which said changes can only be made to the report at the discretion of its independent “skilled persons”.