The long-running class action brought by 30,000 claimants against oil company Trafigura has settled for £30m.

The settlement, approved by Mr Justice MacDuff yesterday (23 September) will see the claimants, represented by Leigh Day & Co, receive £950 each. The class action claimed that they were poisoned by 'slops' – toxic waste dumped near Abidjan, Ivory Coast in 2006.

Commodities trading company Trafigura, represented by Macfarlanes head of contentious construction and engineering Simon Nurney, said that it regretted the incident but did not accept legal liability because the dumping was carried out by a ship contractor which had acted independently of Trafigura.