Mesothelioma Lump Sum Payments (Conditions and Amounts) (Amendment) Regulations 2023

Baroness Sherlock Excerpts

Monday 6th March 2023 Grand Committee

[Lord Allan of Hallam (LD)]

My Lords, on the substance of the two instruments before us and the uprating of payments by 10.1%, we on these Benches, like the noble Lords, Lord Wigley and Lord Jones, of course welcome that. I have learned a lot from noble Lords in the debate. I know from reading Hansard on their previous appearances on these uprating instruments that they have long and honourable records of advocating for sufferers of these appalling diseases. I thank both noble Lords present and those whom the noble Lord, Lord Alton of Liverpool, reminded us are no longer with us. Their words have helped to inform me and provided me with information that I understand will be useful in future years, as we continue to come back to debate these issues.

Much has been said that I will not repeat, but I will emphasise three areas that I am interested in and where I hope the noble Viscount might be able to expand in his response. The first is the question of the latest trends in the numbers of sufferers. As he pointed out, there is an expectation that they will decline once we reach a point 30 years or so after there was a reduction in the use of asbestos. But it would be interesting to hear from the Minister the extent to which there have been any surprises in the data, to understand more about the distribution of sufferers geographically and in terms of their professions, which has already been raised, their gender and any other factors that have surprised people, given the expected exposure and rate of suffering.

The noble Lord, Lord Wigley, was right to remind us that the exposure is not finished. Indeed, as we stand here, we are standing over huge amounts of asbestos, which is securely contained within the basement but which, at some point, will have to be removed as the works take place on this building. That is true across the country: in the 20th century a huge amount of electrical infrastructure was put in using asbestos as a fire preventer, and that is being replaced; people are now saying, “We need to get rid of it”. Whether that is meters in people’s own domestic premises or something on this scale, asbestos exposure is not finished—it will be an ongoing issue. I know that is broader than the instruments before us today, but I hope the Minister will make sure that his colleagues with relevant responsibilities continue to focus on that.

The predictions of expected sufferers would be helpful—not about individuals but about the population as a whole. Making that information public would help people to understand what is taking place. The Minister raised the effect of Covid on the figures, and I think the noble Lord, Lord Alton, asked whether diagnoses were missed during that period. Again, if there were changes during the Covid period, it is really important that we understand whether they were material changes or changes because of practice—because people were no longer presenting to their doctors and, therefore, in a sense, there is a false lowering of the numbers, rather than a genuine change in what has been occurring.

The second area about which it would be interesting to hear from the Minister is research, particularly the development of international networks. It has been mentioned that this affects people across many different countries. I was interested to see PREDICT-Meso, a network of international researchers run by the University of Glasgow involving countries in the EU but also countries such as India and Brazil, which industrialised very rapidly in the 20th century and which will also, sadly, see significant issues. Given that government support for scientific research is very topical at the moment, I am keen to understand the extent to which the Government are supporting research being carried out in this area. Can the Minister say any more about government support for research networks into respiratory diseases?

My final point, which has been touched on already, is about why the uprating is a manual rather than an automatic process. I can see from Hansard that this has been repeated on many occasions. I am sure that those who support the Minister did not have to do much work to recycle the comments made in previous years, but it would be interesting to hear from him again why the Government believe that this should continue to be a manual rather than an automatic process, whereby the people planning can understand that they will be entitled to the uprating, rather than us having to debate it each year. Perhaps the Minister will surprise us and there will be a change in the Government’s position this year, but I will not hang on for that.

I hope that the Minister can put some flesh on those three points about predicted numbers, government support for research and the manual versus automatic process. I will be interested to hear about them, but, as I said, broadly speaking, we welcome the 10.1% increase.

[Baroness Sherlock (Lab)]

My Lords, I thank the Minister for introducing these regulations to the Committee, and all noble Lords who have spoken. As we have heard celebrated by my noble friend Lord Jones and others, the sums payable under the 1979 and the 2008 schemes are to be uprated by 10.1%—the rate of inflation as measured by the CPI 12-month rate last September, which is in line with other social security benefits, including the industrial injuries benefit.

First, I join the Minister in remembering all those who have suffered so much from these terrible diseases. Although many of us would like not to have to come back every year, it is at least an opportunity to pay tribute to them and to remember the lives so blighted. These schemes continue to provide crucial compensation to those who suffer from these terrible diseases and their families. Annual deaths from mesothelioma in Britain increased steeply over the last half century, due mainly, as we have heard, to the widespread industrial use of asbestos from about 1950 to 1980, which accounts for the high death rates among males over 70 whose younger working lives coincided with that period of peak asbestos use. It is good to see that death rates from mesothelioma among the under 65s have been falling.

I looked through the latest statistics on mesothelioma deaths published by the Health and Safety Executive last year, which went up to 2020. As the noble Lord, Lord Alton, said, there were 2,544 mesothelioma deaths in Great Britain in 2020, 6% up on 2019 but similar to the average across the previous eight years. But as the Minister pointed out, there are gender differences here. Those deaths comprise 2,085 men and 459 women. The projections are that annual deaths in men will reduce after 2020 but that female deaths will not, likely staying in the range of 400 to 500 throughout the 2020s but hopefully reducing further after that. Does the Minister know why there is this gender difference? I would be interested to know anything he can share on that.