The UK's umbrella Trades Union Congress (TUC) and Union of Construction, Allied Trades and Technicians (UCATT) have welcomed a new High Court ruling which forces insurance companies to honor compensation claims of victims of mesothelioma, the disease most commonly triggered by the inhalation of asbestos dust. This ruling also enables employers to ask their insurer to pay them back the compensation they voluntarily awarded. (Ref. 080965)
A complex, controversial case: The decision essentially overturns an earlier 2006 ruling by the UK Appeals Court, which sought to establish insurance companies’ liability at the moment of disease manifestation, and not, as previously the case, at the time of asbestos exposure. Following this ruling, insurance companies have been dealing with an increasing number of claims from victims who were exposed to the lethal dust during the course of their working lives, and therefore eligible for compensation under their former employers’ insurance policies, refused to pay on the grounds that the illness was contracted several years before.
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