Asbestos payment to bypass ruling

7:38am Thursday 10th July 2008

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VICTIMS of an asbestos-related condition will receive compensation of up to £5,000 to bypass a shock court ruling under plans set out yesterday.

A Government consultation paper proposed a "no fault"

scheme to speed payouts to people with pleural plaques - a condition that can trigger serious respiratory diseases, including mesothelioma and lung cancer.

The condition - a scarring of the lungs caused by inhaling asbestos fibres - will become an increasing problem in areas such as the North- East, because of the region's history of heavy industry.

Payouts of £5,000 to £7,000 were common for 20 years before the Law Lords decided, last year, that insurance firms were not liable - a ruling described as "outrageous" by Labour MPs.

However, yesterday's proposals will anger many campaigners by firmly rejecting calls to overturn that ruling, despite the Scottish government's pledge to do so.

Changing the law would cost up to £28.6bn and open the floodgates to compensation for workers worried about exposure to passive smoking, or to the sun in the building industry, the document warns.

Furthermore, it suggests only pleural plaque-sufferers who developed the condition before the Law Lords ruling - on October 17, last year - should receive payouts.

That would leave future victims with nothing, even though the "ticking timebomb"

of asbestos exposure means cases are expected for up to 40 years into the future.

Taxpayers, rather than the insurance industry, are likely to fund the scheme and plans for insurance firms to partfund a register of all pleural plaques sufferers have been ditched as "disproportionate".

The proposals were quickly condemned by Labour MP Michael Clapham, who said: "The disease is caused by negligent exposure to asbestos, which causes a physiological change, and the victim should be compensated.

"This is a working class disease and there is no doubt that had it been a middle class disease, the judges would have contrived a way to pay compensation."

More than 2,000 people - mostly men - died from mesothelioma across the region during the 25 years to 2005, according to official figures.

Among the blackspots, measured by the mortality rate (MR) where 100 is the national average, were South Tyneside (317), Hartlepool (240), Sunderland (230). Stockton (211) and Redcar and Cleveland (167).

But the death toll is expected to rise, peaking as high as 2,450 deaths a year across Britain by 2015, compared to only 153 in 1968.

Among the many uses of asbestos was as insulation in ships, exposing workers during fitting-out and ship breaking, with carpenters, joiners, plumbers and heating engineers particularly at risk.

However, the consultation, issued by the Ministry of Justice, says "no causal link has been established between pleural plaques and the development of asbestos-related diseases".

Although payouts of £5,000 are suggested, the consultation says a lower figure may be more appropriate, adding: "This is likely to be necessary to make a no-fault scheme affordable."