UK CAT approves Home Office–funded class action against Motorola

The Competition Appeal Tribunal has granted Clare Spottiswoode CBE’s application for a collective proceedings order against Airwave Solutions and Motorola, allowing the £600-650 million standalone abuse-of-dominance claim to proceed on an opt-out basis. The claim alleges that Motorola charged excessive prices for its Airwave emergency-services network between 2020 and 2023 after delays to the new Emergency Services Network left the UK government locked into its monopoly contract.

A central feature of the judgment was the Tribunal’s scrutiny of the litigation funding agreement—an unusual arrangement in which the Home Office itself funds the litigation while also being the largest class member. Motorola had objected that the agreement’s exclusion clauses gave the government scope to avoid liability for adverse costs by alleging “unreasonable” conduct by the class representative. After the hearing, the parties negotiated amendments designed to close that gap.

Read the decision here.