Update
Spoken again to him and he's said the dash lights stay on.
His adventure tonight to get petrol and he bumped it to a stop at the pump and filled up. It then wouldn't start up and all the dash lights died, the satnav went black with a small red cross on it. He pressed the screen and fiddled with it for about ten minutes then all of a sudden the dash lit up so he tried the car and it started, everything working fine.
Drove it home and it wouldn't turn off so he put the key back in and tried again and then it did turn off
So weird
The car has also had a diagnostic check when the battery was changed and no fault codes returned. He bought it off me at the start of the summer and it's only done about 100 miles since and the only change was the battery dying and a new one going on
He's going to put himself at the mercy of VW themselves tomorrow to see what they think about it all