Jenner & Block chair defends GM to Congress

Anton Valukas, chair of Jenner & Block, has been defending the actions of General Motors in front of a US House of Representatives energy and commerce sub-committee, in an inquiry into its fatal ignition problems.

Mr Valukas conducted an investigation into the problems which have led to at least 13 deaths and the recall of 2.6m vehicles. A major issue appears to have been that senior managers may have been kept unaware of the issues as they developed before February this year.

No cover up

But Mr Valukas told the sub-committee that there had been no cover up. Defining a cover up as when someone is aware that there is a safety issue and takes measures to conceal the situation from others, he told legislators: ‘We did not find that'. ‘They were treating this as a customer convenience issue, instead of a safety issue.’

Compensation

GM has appointed Ken Feinberg, who supervised the US government’s September 11th Victim Compensation Fund, to oversee compensation arrangements for deaths and seriously injured as a result of the ignition problem.

Source: CBC News and Financial Times