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In a response to Unionsafety's Chris Ingram, she points out that as a Government Minister she is unable to sign any of the Early Day Motions that come up in Parliament as tradition has it that they are purely a mechanism of Back Bench MPs. In her letter she says, "As a Government Minister, I am unable to sign EDMs as parliamentary protocol restricts the use of EDMs to backbench M Ps. However, I wrote recently Lord McKenzie of Luton on behalf of the Merseyside Asbestos Victims Support Group as I share the concerns of my constituents about this measure."
" Regulation 4(4) of the Employers' Liability (Compulsory Insurance) Regulations 1998 came into force on 1 January 1999 and compels employers who are required to hold employers' liability (EL) insurance to retain policy certificates for 40 years. The Regulation has no effect on policy information that pre-dated its introduction. There is also no provision for ensuring the preservation of records if a company ceases trading." He said. He goes further, " The current regulation carries no penalty for non-compliance and therefore is not enforced in practice. Although some stakeholders, including the TUC, have called for a penalty for non-compliance, they recognise that enforcement is not likely to be possible or practical." The government response is to ensure that employers keep records and that they realise the need for employer's liability insurance in order to mitigate the cost of litigation:
Clearly the governments once again is going down the voluntarism road which history has shown with so many things relating to employment and health & safety, does not work. there are those who believe that the future will show that it is now even more difficult for bad employers to be held into account for workplace injury and deaths. Download Lord MCKenzie's full letter here Details of the EDM and the petition your MP MUST sign can be found here Source: Unionsafety
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Wallasey MP, Angela Eagle has responded to constituency signatories to EDM2010 calling on the Government to establish a central electronic database for the compulsory recording of all employers' liability insurance policies before the repeal of regulation 4(4) of the Employers' Liability (Compulsory Insurance) Regulations 1998.
Enclosing the response from Lord McKenzie to her concerns, it is clear that the Government view existing 40 year rule legislation concerning Employers Liability insurance as none effective and unpoliced and therefore worthy of being repealed.
"Advice to business on how to protect against costly claims made against their EL cover would seem the most appropriate way to raise the profile of this issue. Officials at the Department for Work and Pensions will be working with colleagues at the Health and Safety Executive (HSE), who publish guidance in this area, to ensure that the danger of ignoring the potential problems arising from claims for long-tail diseases and the failure to maintain records is made perfectly clear to businesses. The potential for new long-tail diseases to emerge should also not be discounted."