Natashca Engel, the Member of Parliament for North East Derbyshire has put forward an Early Day Motion in the House of Commons for a debate into the Court of Appeal’s decision to overturn the High Court’s earlier decision which allowed mesothelioma victims to receive compensation. 

Mr Justice Burton, sitting in the High Court decided that when the former employers of mesothelioma victims took out insurance at the time of employment, they were entitled to compensation from the insurer regardless of whether the wording used in the policy was  sustained, contracted or caused during the policy period. Click here to see our previous article on the High Court decision. 

The motion put forward stated as follows:-

“That this House is concerned that the implications of the decision by the Court of Appeal on 8 October 2010 will be that many victims of asbestos-related disease will die without the certainty that their families will be entitled to compensation; agrees it is the exposure to asbestos that can lead to the development of fatal diseases such as mesothelioma and that the trigger must therefore be the point of exposure and not, as challenged by the insurance industry, the point the disease develops which can be many decades later; further agrees with the High Court ruling in 2008 that the insurers who should pay compensation are those who provided cover to the employer at the time of the asbestos exposure; notes this is the latest of many attacks by the insurance industry on compensation for working people who were negligently exposed to deadly asbestos; and calls on the Association of British Insurers to cease its unrelenting attack on the victims of asbestos.”

To date, 62 Members of Parliament are signatories to this motion. 

Further information:

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Notes 

We are a specialist personal injury law firm.  We have been handling claims for industrial disease for over 30 years.  Most of our work involves acting for asbestos disease victims. 

We only act for the sufferers of asbestos diseases and never act for the organisations that caused the asbestos exposure or their insurers. 

We have an ethical approach and pledge to donate 10% of our net profits every year to good causes that help asbestos sufferers. 

We have also been involved in most of the landmark judgments that shape this area of law.  Find out more about us or find out about our reported cases.  We are on the panels of several asbestos support groups and are ranked highly by legal guides. 

John Pickering and Partners LLP is a niche legal practice that has represented Claimants in the leading asbestos "test cases" in the last ten years. The firm represented Sylvia Barker in Barker v Corus (UK) Plc, a case that highlighted the legal tactics of employers and insurers trying to cut back their compensation liabilities to mesothelioma sufferers, and which prompted the amendment of the Compensation Act 2006 to ensure full compensation for mesothelioma claims. The firm represented two of the three Claimants in the Fairchild appeal, in which the insurance industry tried unsuccessfully to block compensation altogether for mesothelioma sufferers unable to identify which of two or more sources of asbestos exposure had caused their illness.

The firm represented Alice Jefferson, a mesothelioma sufferer, whose illness and compensation claim against Cape Asbestos were featured in the important documentary "Alice: A Fight For Life."   Shown by Yorkshire Television in July 1982, the programme was an important catalyst for legal change and public awareness of the plight of mesothelioma and other asbestos disease sufferers and a prompt for important legal reform.

Mesothelioma is a type of cancer that affects the lining of certain bodily organs.  It most commonly affects the lining of the lungs (the pleura) but it can affect other areas including organs in the abdominal cavity (the peritoneum).

According to the British Lung Foundation, more than 2,000 people are diagnosed with mesothelioma every year in the UK and there is one mesothelioma death every five hours. The number of deaths from mesothelioma increased from 153 in 1968 to 1,969 in 2004 and is expected to peak at 2,450 between 2011 and 2015.

The British Lung Foundation, supported by John Pickering and Partners LLP, launched the first Action Mesothelioma Day on 27th February 2006, to raise awareness about mesothelioma, to improve the treatment and care of mesothelioma patients, and to lobby for better funding for research into mesothelioma and for the protection and education of people working with asbestos.