Coal compensation scheme failings

摘要

The committee of Public Accounts has heavily criticised the management of two schemes set up to compensate coal miners who suffered ill health because of their work.rnIn January 1998, the Department of Trade and Industry (now the Department for Business, Enterprise and Regulatory Reform) established two schemes to pay compensation to miners suf-rnfering from lung disease caused by coal dust (Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease or COPD) and hand injuries caused by using vibrating equipment (Vibration White Finger or VWF).rnThe department received over three quarters of a million claims from former miners, their widows, or their estates for COPD (592,000) and VWF (170,000), greatly exceeding its initial forecasts of 173,000 COPD and 45,000 VWF claims. Consequently some claimants have had to wait as long as ten years or more to receive any payment.