North Rhine-Westphalia: State wants to enable joint liability of forest owners

Düsseldorf/Dortmund (dpa/lnw) - In the case of a multi-million dollar cartel lawsuit by 32 sawmills against the state of North Rhine-Westphalia, around 800 forest owners could be held jointly liable if the state were to lose.

North Rhine-Westphalia: State wants to enable joint liability of forest owners

Düsseldorf/Dortmund (dpa/lnw) - In the case of a multi-million dollar cartel lawsuit by 32 sawmills against the state of North Rhine-Westphalia, around 800 forest owners could be held jointly liable if the state were to lose. The state has now initiated a so-called third-party notice, as announced by the Ministry of Agriculture in Düsseldorf on Tuesday. A corresponding letter from the district court of Dortmund will be sent to the forest owners shortly.

The dispute is about joint timber marketing practiced until the end of 2019. The state not only sold its own wood, but also wood from local authorities and private owners. In April 2020, the sawmills filed an antitrust lawsuit for damages with the Dortmund District Court because of allegedly excessive wood prices. According to the ministry, they claim damage of around 187 million euros.

The total relates to the period from mid-2005 to the end of 2019 plus interest. The sawmills have assigned their claims to a "compensation company for the sawmill industry in North Rhine-Westphalia", a debt collection company set up specifically for the lawsuit, according to the state. The country dismissed the lawsuit as unfounded. The procedure is still pending at the LG Dortmund (Az. 8 O 7/2020). A hearing was scheduled for June. A court spokesman said there were no comment periods. There is no new date yet.

The ministry described the notice of dispute as a "usual procedural precautionary measure" that is required by the state budget regulations. In total, around 17,000 forest owners participated in marketing during the period. In order to reduce the scope, third-party notices have been limited to larger companies. Among the 800 are also 67 municipalities.

The 800 forest owners now have the opportunity to "stand by the side of the country" in order to go together in the further legal dispute against the sawmills, it said. But they are not obliged to do so. "If you decide not to join, there are no immediate costs," it said. The Ministry expects that the process will go through all instances and that the Federal Court of Justice will make a decision at the end. This will probably only be the case in a few years. There are similar lawsuits in other states.