The Court of Appeal in England has given a Credit Hire company leave to launch contempt of court proceedings against seven former employees of a company, whose job it was to investigate, on behalf of insurance companies, spot hire rates of hire cars in areas where accidents occurred, it has been reported.

The Accusation is that the employees had given evidence alleging research that actually did not take place at all, and may have ‘infected’ up to 30,000 cases.

The Court (Lord Justice Moses sitting with Mr. Justice Irwin) ordered that the documents in the case be sent to the attorney-general, Dominic Grieve QC. The attorney-general has been given three months to come to a decision as to whether a criminal prosecution should be launched.