Clause 58
Welfare Reform Bill
9:30 am
Jim Murphy (Minister of State (Work), Department for Work and Pensions; East Renfrewshire, Labour)
We all do, as I was about to say.
This important proposal corrects an anomaly in the 1979 Act in which provision for Scottish reputed spouses—a man and a woman living together as husband and wife—was omitted in error. If these changes are not made, there is a risk of challenge to the 1979 Act because of discrimination on the grounds of sexual orientation. Whether there is such a challenge or not, the Government wish to bring the Pneumoconiosis etc. (Workers' Compensation) Act up to date to fit in with the wider civil rights and equality legislation that came into force last year.
The hon. Member for Inverness, Nairn, Badenoch and Strathspey mentioned the work of his hon. Friend the Member for Rochdale, who works closely with my hon. Friend the Member for Heywood and Middleton (Jim Dobbin). They are parliamentary neighbours and both work hard on this issue.
The hon. Member for Inverness, Nairn, Badenoch and Strathspey mentioned the case of someone who contracts mesothelioma from a particle from a piece of clothing in a household environment. For example, a wife—it is almost always a wife, but I am not trying to make a gender-specific point—may have contracted the disease by inhaling a particle from clothing as she washed it or hang it out to dry. Clause 58 does not capture that but we are looking at the issue in the context of a wider review of how we treat mesothelioma generally, although that is not the purpose of the clause. However, it is part of the considerations at the mesothelioma summit and the work being carried out by the Industrial Injuries Advisory Council. The clause does not, in itself, give legal effect in respect of the specific concerns that the hon. Gentleman raised.