£16 million record year for Field Fisher Waterhouse’s Asbestos Claims Group
28 January 2009
In 2008, the Asbestos
Claims Group at law firm Field Fisher Waterhouse LLP
recovered over £16 million in compensation for victims of
asbestos-related diseases in 124 successful cases. Over the years,
the lawyers in the firm’s Asbestos Claims Group have recovered a
total of £132 million in 2025 successful claims.
Some of the significant cases over the past year have
included:
- Winning an award of £703,000 for the widow and family of a
52 year old partner in an engineering firm who died from
mesothelioma following exposure to asbestos at work. This is
amongst only a handful of awards exceeding £500,000 across England
and Wales.
- Winning £100,000 damages (plus legal costs) for a retired
teacher who developed mesothelioma by using drawing pins to pin
children’s work to the walls of her prefab classroom, which
contained asbestos.
- In a landmark case the firm recovered £12,500 for the value of
hospice care as part of a £170,000 settlement for a man who
worked with asbestos in 1963 and contracted mesothelioma in 2005.
The funding of hospice care is almost exclusively by charitable
donation and this is thought to be the first time a firm of
solicitors has recovered the cost of care in this way.
- Field Fisher Waterhouse acted for the family of a 75 year old
man who died due to mesothelioma, and who used to take care of his
grandchildren after school in term times. The defendants initially
denied that this was compensatable, since there was no reported
precedent for it, however the firm recovered £109,352 at a High
Court hearing including £27,960 for the grandchildren’s care.
Our team of asbestos lawyers has also been actively lobbying the
House of Commons, requesting that the Government overturn the House
of Lords ruling that pleural plaques - a scarring of the lining of
the lungs as a result of exposure to asbestos - is not a
compensatable disease. The team also responded to the Ministry of
Justice's consultation on the Law Lords' pleural plaques
ruling.
Asbestos-related diseases affect thousands of people in the UK
each year. Factory workers and labourers are amongst those who are
commonly affected, but Field Fisher Waterhouse has also acted on
behalf of professionals such as doctors, nurses and teachers who
have been exposed to asbestos through their work. Field Fisher
Waterhouse LLP is a leader in the field of Asbestos
Claims.
Rodney Nelson-Jones, head of the
Asbestos Claims Group at Field Fisher Waterhouse, said: “I am
delighted that in 2008 we were able to win over £16 million in
compensation for the victims of these terrible diseases. It
is crucial that sufferers and their families receive the
compensation they deserve.”
For further press information, please
contact:
Louise Eckersley, PR Manager,
Field Fisher Waterhouse LLP on 020 7861 4120.