Mesothelioma Lump Sum Payments (Conditions and Amounts) (Amendment) Regulations 2021 Debate
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Lord McNally
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Mesothelioma Lump Sum Payments (Conditions and Amounts) (Amendment) Regulations 2021
Lord McNally Excerpts(3 years, 10 months ago)
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Lord McNally (LD) [V]
My Lords, it is a pleasure to follow the noble Lord, Lord Blunkett, and his reminder of just what a battle the miners had for proper compensation for pneumoconiosis.
Like many people speaking today, I suspect, I have a personal link. My sister, Betty, died of mesothelioma about 15 years ago. It is interesting what a pernicious disease it was. She died in her mid-70s, but one suggestion was that she might have contracted the disease when she left school and went to work in the local ICI, spinning fireproof clothing with cotton and asbestos woven into it. It was freely admitted that the disease might have an incubation period of 50 years. It is a pernicious disease and a cruel one.
I welcome what the Minister has announced today to the effect that notice has been taken of the impact of Covid. Of course, that is a respiratory disease, and one hopes that the understanding of how it could impact on people who are already in the early stages of pneumoconiosis suggests that they should have priority in terms of vaccination.
The 2008 Act was a great step forward, and Parliament can also take credit that there have been nudges since to remove some of the bureaucracy that was left in place so that people get action quicker and more effectively. However, I know from the time when I was a Minister the interest of the noble Lord, Lord Alton, who is not with us today—he is probably doing good somewhere else. Last year he reminded us that 5% to 10% of mesothelioma victims survive for fewer than five years and that we have the highest rate of disease anywhere in the world. So this is not a job done. However, so far as this order is concerned and in terms of the Minister taking responsibility for it, I think there is general confidence that in the noble Baroness, Lady Stedman-Scott, we have someone who will ask the right questions and demand the right action.