UK Law and Practice Contributed by: Samantha Ward, Ben Jasper, Oliver Carroll and Bethany Downey, Clifford Chance LLP
The limitation rules in competition claims are com - plex and depend on: (i) whether the claim is brought in the CAT or the High Court; (ii) whether the claim is standalone or follow on; (iii) when the claim is issued; and (iv) when the infringement of competition law occurred. At first instance in the MIF Umbrella and Merricks pro - ceedings [2023] CAT 49, the claimants argued that a post-Brexit decision of the Court of Justice of the European Union (Case C-267/20, Volvo AB and DAF Trucks NV v RM , EU:C:2022:494) meant that limita - tion periods in a claim for damages for competition law infringements could not begin to run until: (i) the time when the infringement of competition law had ceased; and (ii) when the injured party knows, or can reasonably be expected to know, the fact it has suf - fered harm as a result of the infringement and the identity of the perpetrator. This would have marked a significant change to the limitation rules which apply for damages suffered prior to 9 March 2017 which currently, for example, only allow for a two-year limita - tion period for proceedings that commenced after 1 October 2015 where the facts giving rise to the claim arose before 1 October 2015, when brought in the CAT and relate to standalone competition claims. If the claimants were correct, this would mean the limitation period could not begin to run until the infringement of competition law ceased and the injured party could be reasonably expected to know the fact it suffered harm and the identity of the perpetrator, potentially extend - ing the limitation period significantly. The claimants argued that the CAT was bound to follow this decision despite it being handed down post-Brexit. The CAT disagreed with the claimants’ analysis as to the effect of the CJEU’s judgment and also found that, in any event, the CAT was not bound to follow the decision post-Brexit. The Court of Appeal recently upheld the CAT’s judg - ment in December 2024 ([2024] EWCA Civ 1559), confirming that a so-called cessation requirement is not part of English law for limitation periods to start, providing clarity that the limitation periods in English law have not been revised. In a further judgment, in Lundbeck v Secretary of State for Health and Social Care [2025] EWCA Civ
677, the Court of Appeal clarified the application of the limitation rules when a claim is issued in the High Court but transferred to the CAT. The claim involved a standalone claim for damages for breaches of Arti - cle 101 which was transferred from the High Court to the CAT by way of a consent order. That order made clear that the transfer would not alter, limit or exclude any accrued rights including as to limitation. This was important because the High Court claim had been filed out of time. The Court of Appeal held that once a transfer has taken place, the proceedings were CAT proceedings and were subject to the provisions on limitation in the CAT rules (which were more generous in the circumstances of this claim), even if the High Court proceedings were time-barred. Collective actions There have also been a number of important devel - opments in collective action proceedings before the Competition Appeal Tribunal. Certification The certification process for collective proceedings brought in the CAT has been heavily litigated since the regime was introduced in 2015. Under Section 47B of the CA 1998 (as amended by the CRA 2015), any collective proceedings may only proceed if the CAT makes a collective proceedings order. Since the 2020 Supreme Court judgment in Walter Merricks CBE v Mastercard Incorporated & Ors [2020] UKSC 51, the bar to certification has generally been considered to be relatively low, with the vast majority of cases being certified. However, there have been two recent cases where a collective proceedings order has not been made which may indicate a trend towards greater scrutiny of certification applications in the CAT. The first was in the case Christine Riefa Class Rep- resentative Limited v Apple Inc. & Others [2025] CAT 5, where the Competition Appeal Tribunal refused the application for certification on the basis that the Tribu - nal did not consider the Proposed Class Representa - tive (PCR) satisfied the authorisation conditions to be a Class Representative. A PCR must demonstrate that they are capable of acting fairly and adequately in the interests of class members in order to fulfil the
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