VW boss Matthias Mueller rejected calls to compensate owners in Europe over the diesel emissions scandal just like the company did in the US, were it struck a the $15 billion deal with the authorities.
Last week Europe’s Industry Commissioner Elzbieta Bienkowska called the company to also compensate European owners of its rigged diesel-powered vehicles, stating that it would be unfair for them to be treated differently from US customers just because of the different legal system, Reuters reports.
“We have a different situation here (in Europe),” Mueller was quoted as saying by German newspaper Welt am Sonntag. He also stated that, while VW was on a solid financial footing, replicating the US deal in Europe would be proven tough for the company to cope with financially. Mueller said he spoken to Bienkowska in Brussels this week about the matter.
“You don’t have to be a mathematician to realize that compensation at arbitrarily high levels would overwhelm Volkswagen,” he said. “In the U.S. the (emission) limits are stricter, which makes the fix more complicated. And taking part in the buyback is voluntary (for customers), which is not the case in Germany, for example”.
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