That is often trotted out by VW fanbois and apologists, but the law says otherwise.
VW Group AG is a
legal continuation of the original organisation, and can trace its contiguous ownership and management back to the the years precceding WW2. The very first sentence says it all...
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Volkswagen
The company was indeed rescued by Major Ivan Hirst and almost certainly would have faltered without his intervention, but was never
legally owned by either him or the British government. The company has changed legal status and form over they decades, but there is direct and traceable legal continuity from one end of its history to the other.
That VW Group eventually paid compensation in the 1990's is a matter of public record. Why did they pay out tens of millions of Euros is, as you say, there is no legal continuity between the organisations? Clearly VW Group did not think itmsilly, and ducked, dived, dodged and
lied about it until 1996, before eventually making an admission.
They lied. So not only did those acts taken place during the war, but the board of the modern company saw fit to lie about it, only coming clean when the weight of evidence against them was such that they were, frankly, looking very silly with their persistent denials. These are senior board members from modern times, lying about murder and death, not the actions of people that occurred 8 decades remote in time.
Indeed, as recently as 2019 the VW chief executive, Herbert Diess, thought it appropriate to quip, "Arbeit Macht Frei" at a company event when referencing the organisations profits. This translates as "Work Sets You Free", the words set in wrought iron over the gates at Dachau. It's clear they have not learned any humilty, and are unrepentant about the organisations history.
And your assertion also conveniently overlooks the estimated 5000 annual additional deaths in Europe from air pollution that VW's deliberate failure to adhere to emissions laws is believed to have caused. If anyone else killed 5000 people a year in Europe you'd be baying for blood, yet here you are sticking up for them. Strange.