Minister Rebuked For Giggling During Asbestos Compensation Debate
Yesterday, during the debate on the House of Lords amendments to the Legal Aid, Sentencing and Punishment of Offenders Bill (LASPO), a Government minister, Tory MP Jonathan Djanogly, was seen to laugh and giggle as Labour MP’s were detailing some of the appalling cases of workers suffering from Mesothelioma as a result of being exposed at work to Asbestos.
Just one example of a speech detailing the tragedy of Mesothelioma victims, as recorded by Hansard, during the debate eliciting laughter from the minister was that of David Anderson Labour MP:
"Mr David Anderson (Blaydon) (Lab) said:
What can I say? Someone said earlier that no empathy is being shown, but I think that empathy is being shown—to the insurance companies. We can take our guidance from that.
The Minister talked about the compensation culture, but it is very easy to stop that culture: tell employers to stop killing people at work and to stop poisoning people at work. Then people would not be able to claim compensation.
That is exactly what needs to be done. We are talking about employers who have contempt for workers and their families. They let workmen go home in dirty work clothes that their wives then washed, and became infected with mesothelioma through doing so. What happened was known by employers.
We are talking about employers who were using young kids in Namibia to fill plastic sacks with raw asbestos. They put young kids of seven, eight or nine in the sacks to tamp the asbestos down. That is the type of people we are dealing with—people with no regard for human life. Some successful cases were brought by a trade union in South Africa and they got £38 million in compensation.
That £38 million was welcome but it did not save the lives of any of those kids.
We have had 42,000 people die in the past 40 years in this country and 60,000 more will die in the next 50. That is more than 1,000 people a year and more than were being killed in the coal mines in this country in the disastrous years of the 1930s. That is why this is a special issue.
We should be looking to people such as Chris Knighton in the north-east of England who has led a campaign on behalf of her husband who died 15 years ago—a man who was fit enough to ride from Newcastle to Berwick on a bike on a Sunday morning and think nothing about it.
He fell down one day in the local club and when he went to see the doctor, the doctor told him, “You’ve got mesothelioma” He asked, “What does that mean?” The doctor said, “It means you’re going to be dead in nine months’ time.”
Those are the people we are standing up for today. We are not standing up for big business or insurers—we are standing up for ordinary people who have been exploited for years. If we do not support the amendments to this legislation we will be letting those people down.
I say to the Liberal Democrats in particular, “If you ever want to claw back from where you are now, support these amendments tonight. You will never be forgiven if you don’t.”
It was during such exchanges in the debate from the Labour benches that a Treasury minister by the name of Mr Djanogly was seen to be giggling and commenting upon opposition bench examples being given of the suffering incurred by mesothelioma victims.
The Minister, Mr Djanogly was later rebuked by Labour MP Helen Jones.
The full rebuke and lack of response from Mr Djanogly, plus The Speakers comments were recorded in Hansard:
"Helen Jones: On a point of order, Mr Speaker. During the last debate, many of us were dismayed by the conduct of the Minister, who giggled and grinned through descriptions of people dying of mesothelioma and what they suffered. I have to say that in almost 15 years in this House, I have never seen conduct that so demeans a Minister of the Crown and is so damaging to the reputation of the House. Is there anything that you can do to ensure that in future Ministers pay proper attention to such serious debates and conduct themselves as would be expected from a Member on the Treasury Bench?
Mr Speaker: I am grateful to the hon. Lady for her point of order. The Minister is welcome to respond if he wishes, but he is not under any obligation to do so.
Mr Djanogly indicated dissent.
Mr Speaker: No, he is not going to respond.
The hon. Member for Warrington North (Helen Jones) will know that I came into the proceedings relatively late, and in those circumstances it is not for me to act as umpire on the matter, which would be wrong. However, her observations, sincerely expressed, have been noted, and all I would say is that each and every one of us in this place is responsible for his or her own behaviour and for the impression that we give in the conduct of debate. Let us leave it there for tonight."
Read the full debate via Hansard here
Source: Hansard
