National Australia Bank and its former British subsidiary Clydesdale & Yorkshire Banking Group have broken cover to emphatically reject the claims made in a British class action suit, setting the stage for a potential courtroom stoush later this year.
In an end-July court filing that marks NAB’s first formal response to the potentially multimillion-dollar class action, the bank described several of the litigants’ claims as “without foundation” and “embarrassing”.
And a CYBG representative told The Australian Financial Review that there was “no merit” and “no substance” to the allegations, so the British bank planned to “defend its position robustly” as the litigation unfolded.
But RGL Management, the company overseeing the class action for the former CYBG customers, immediately hit back.
“There is nothing in the lengthy, expensive and obfuscatory defences that we didn’t expect. The bottom line is they have failed to answer the allegations in our particulars of claim,” James Hayward, the Australian CEO of London-based RGL, said in a statement on Friday.
