Clause 41
Child Maintenance and Other Payments Bill
11:00 am
Andrew Selous (Shadow Minister, Work & Pensions; South West Bedfordshire, Conservative)
I welcome you to the Chair, Mr. Taylor, and I pay tribute to the hon. Gentleman. He says that he is not expert in these matters, but he has been extremely diligent in working on them in the House over a number of years, and most of us would certainly regard him as far more of an expert than we are.
Opposition Members very much welcome the proposals. It is the Opposition’s job to oppose where we think that the Government have got things wrong, and we have done so constructively on quite a few occasions with regard to this Bill. However, the provisions before us are a very worthwhile solution—indeed, they have been described as a creative solution—to the problems raised by an extremely distressing disease.
Let me briefly put on the record the scope of what we are talking about. The Library note tells us that there were 1,969 mesothelioma deaths in Great Britain in 2004, and that is expected to rise to about 2,400 deaths a year by 2013, before coming down to perhaps 500 deaths a year by 2050. It is quite important for the Committee to realise that although no employers today are—let us hope—putting workers or those who live near their premises at risk of mesothelioma, the legacy of such problems will be with us for a long time to come and there is a considerable tail.
I particularly welcome the fact that clause 41 breaks the strict link that used to exist in respect of having an occupation and being an employee. For the first time, lump sum payments will unquestionably cover family members, such as wives who washed overalls or children who went in the bath just after the worker’s wife had washed the overalls in it—indeed, a constituent told me that she used to go in the bath just after her father’s overalls had been washed in it. Also covered are people who lived next to relevant premises. They were not family members, but they had the misfortune to live or perhaps play next to a factory that was putting them at risk of mesothelioma.
I also welcome particularly the speed with which it is intended the payments will be made. It is perhaps worth putting on the record once more the fact that, once diagnosed, mesothelioma is generally fatal within 12 to 18 months. It is intended that payments will be made within six weeks of diagnosis. That is an ambitious target but, given the distressing speed with which the disease moves, it is right that we aim for such a speed of payment.
I echo the question about subsection (3)(b). It states that regulations
“may prescribe different amounts for different cases or classes of cases or for different circumstances”,
which is vague and opens a wide range of possibilities. I hope that the Minister will give the Committee as much detail as she can, which would be a great help to us.
Paul Rowen rose—