One of the main aims of this act is to enable an easier access to justice for individuals in the cases of mass harm situations act is applied. In particular, in these cases the damages individuals my recieve is often very low in comparison to court and lawyers’ fees, therefore individuals often decide not to take legal action. If the joint class action is applied, they are not burdened with costs of the procedure.
The purpose of collective actions in Slovenian law is to solve disputes in the field of consumer contracts, disputes arising from the producers’ responsibilities regarding faults in products, antitrust disputes and disputes between issuers and investors in the market of financial instruments, labour disputes and civil disputes arising from environmental accidents.
The state attorney or legal entities under private law with a non-profit making character will be permitted to lodge actions.
Although class actions have already been regulated in Slovenian legal system before, namely in consumer disputes, they had not been fully implemented into practice for various reasons. An additional systematic approach was needed, and it is now covered with solutions governed by Class Actions Act. These solutions are not intended solely to facilitate collective protection of rights of individuals suffering damage in court proceedings, but also to create a deterrent effect on the behavior of potential infringers. Class actions, as a rule, are economically or otherwise significantly stronger than individual legal actions, and those affected individuals will now have the opportunity to act together. The Class Actions Act anticipates two types of lawsuits: collective injunctions and collective compensatory actions. While the former was already part of the Slovenian legal system, and was regulated with the provisions of the Consumer Protection Act; the latter action is a new development. Its aim is to obtain compensation for the damages suffered, for which, within an individual system of judicial protection, the beneficiaries rarely decided to lodge actions. Class actions should lesser the burden for individuals.
