Asbestos in Workplaces

Debate between Jeremy Corbyn and Martin Docherty-Hughes

Wednesday 19th April 2023 Westminster Hall

[Jeremy Corbyn (Islington North) (Ind)]

We owe a great debt to the hon. Member for Loughborough (Jane Hunt) for securing the debate and the way in which she moved the motion. I used to be a union organiser in the public sector before I became a Member of Parliament, in the National Union of Public Employees. In the early ’70s, when the debate started about the health, safety and welfare at work legislation, which was put in law in 1974, the issues and dangers of asbestos were known. Huge profits had been made by Turner & Newall and other companies from selling asbestos, and it was installed regularly in lots of places even after the dangers were well known. Asbestos lagging on pipes in heating installations and on exhaust systems of buses and other vehicles led to an awful lot of workers getting mesothelioma as a result.

Our great friend Alice Mahon was also a member of NUPE. She worked in a dilapidated old hospital building in Halifax and in this building. I was at her funeral in Halifax last month. It was a sombre occasion. It was a huge gathering at the minster in Halifax that paid tribute to a wonderful MP and a very principled campaigner. The collection was for victims of asbestos in the Calderdale area. In this debate, we should remember that asbestos can affect anybody. Who would have thought that a Member of Parliament would get this kind of condition from being in this building? This is not about MPs, but a lot of people whose voices have not been heard: those who clean buses or trains, those who work in or install heating systems and, indeed, people quite innocently doing a few home repairs, not realising they have actually pin-pricked into asbestos in a building.

[Martin Docherty-Hughes]

My grandmother, when she lived in Durban Avenue in Clydebank, had a white picket fence brought out of a sheet from Turner’s asbestos factory in Clydebank. The right hon. Member is right to remind us of the differentiation around how people get asbestos. It also relates to where the asbestos is now dumped. Does he share my concern that, besides the traditional aspect of asbestos, it is hidden in grounds across our country? They also need to be investigated—that is to say, hidden asbestos dumps.

[Jeremy Corbyn]

The hon. Member raises a very important point. There are a number of unaudited rubbish dumps around the country, including unaudited rubbish dumps from the Ministry of Defence, many of which will contain asbestos remains that are completely unknown. Somebody will come along, perhaps to construct something on that site, and dig it up. As a result, asbestos will be released into the atmosphere. We are facing a serious issue of epidemic proportions.

In the 45 seconds that I have left, I thank the Minister for being present. We need a full audit of all the asbestos dangers in the country, including the tips and so on that we have mentioned. We need a programme of containment and labelling of it everywhere before it is removed, and we need a programme of removal. We should not be the worst country in Europe, or indeed in most of the world, on the question of asbestos safety; we ought to be the best. None of this is new. All of this has been around a long time, and I hope that today’s short debate will serve as a reminder that this House is determined that we will rid this country of the dangers of asbestos, and the danger of taking lives 50 or 60 years from now.