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Liability for Asbestos Related Disease in England and Germany

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  06 March 2019

Richard Best

Extract

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Newspapers abound with stories of corporate difficulties in connection with asbestos-related lawsuits. Internationally, most litigation to date has taken place in the United States, where high damages awards, comparatively liberal liability theories, and countless claims by not only the sick but also the so-called “worried well” – those who claim to have been exposed to asbestos but who have not yet contracted an asbestos-related disease – have clogged the judicial system and landed many companies in strife. Insurers have also been hit hard.

Type
Private Law
Information
German Law Journal , Volume 4 , Issue 7 , 01 July 2003 , pp. 661 - 683
Copyright
Copyright © 2003 by German Law Journal GbR 

References

* Richard Best is a solicitor and registered foreign lawyer working in the Frankfurt office of international law firm Ashurst Morris Crisp. The author would like to thank colleague Cornelia Hoestermann, Rechtsanwältin in the firm's Munich office, for her assistance in researching certain German issues, and John Evans, partner in the firm's London office, for his comments on an earlier draft. This paper is not intended to be a comprehensive review of all developments in the law and practice or to cover all aspects of those referred to. Readers should take legal advice before applying the information contained in this paper to specific issues or transactions.Google Scholar

1 See, e.g., “Democrats Urge More Talks to End Asbestos Fund Bill Impasse”, 19 June 2003, available online via www.bloomberg.com and www.news.google.com Google Scholar

2 Members of the firm are also well versed in asbestos-related liabilities in other European jurisdictions but discussion of potential liabilities in these countries’ legal systems is beyond the scope of this paper.Google Scholar

3 For further information on asbestos related diseases see, e.g., American Academy of Actuaries “Overview of Asbestos Issues and Trends”, December 2001, p. 2, available online at www.actuary.org/pdf/casualty/mono_dec01asbestos.pdf and Asbestos Diseases Foundation of Australia Inc “Understanding the Disease” available online at www.smarta.com.au/asbestos/disease.html Google Scholar

4 For an historical account of the use of asbestos in the UK, see G Tweedale Magic Mineral to Killer Dust: Turner & Newell and the Asbestos Hazard (Oxford University Press, Oxford, 2000).Google Scholar

5 FitchRatings Special Report “Asbestos: Too Hot to Handle for European Insurers?”, 31 March 2003, available online at www.fitchratings.com Google Scholar

6 UK Department of the Environment, Transport and the Regions “Asbestos and Man-made Mineral Fibres in Buildings: Practical Guidance” (February 2000), para 3.1, available at: www.environmentalcenter.com/articles/article725/article725.htm#3 Google Scholar

7 These statistics are taken from HVBG Report on Occupational Diseases / Fibre Years, 1/1997, available via www.hvbg.de Google Scholar

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10 Figures taken from HVBG articles “Asbest: Berufsgenossenschaften befürchten bis zu 20.000 Todesfälle bis zum Jahr 2020” (17.12.02) and “Berufsgenossenschaften: 957 Todesfälle durch Asbest im Jahr 2000”, available on the HVBG website: www.hvbg.de Google Scholar

11 85/374/EEC.Google Scholar

12 This is but a simple outline; see generally A Dugdale (Ed) Clerk & Lindsell on Torts (18 ed, Sweet & Maxwell, 2001). For example, the notion of “physical harm” can include psychological harm, recoverability for which depends in part on either the pre-existence of outright bodily injury, the law's definition of and distinction between primary and secondary victims of psychologically harmful events and the different proximity requirements for each, or, in cases falling outside these categories, case-by-case analyses of proximity. See further note 24 below.Google Scholar

13 See, e.g., Holtby v Brigham & Cohen (Hull) Limited [2000] 3 All ER 421 (CA) (cumulative disease case); Fairchild v Glenhaven Funeral Services and Others, unreported, High Court, 1 February 2001 and Matthews v The Associated Portland Cement Manufacturers Limited and British Uralite plc, unreported, High Court, 11 July 2001 (competing High Court authorities regarding “all or nothing” disease cases); the Court of Appeal and House of Lords decisions in which this competing line of authority in “all or nothing” disease cases was addressed are discussed in the text following the reference to this note.Google Scholar

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17 [2002] 1 WLR 1052.Google Scholar

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24 For a discussion of the law on this general issue (not regarding asbestos claimants), see the UK Law Commission's report no. 249 Liability for Psychiatric Illness (10 March 1998) available online at www.lawcom.gov.uk/files/lc249.pdf. See also The CJD Disease Litigation: Schedule 2 Plaintiffs v Medical Research Council and Secretary of State for Health (1998) 41 BMLR 157 and (2000) 54 BMLR 111.Google Scholar

25 Section 50(7).Google Scholar

26 Produkthaftungsgesetz of 15 December 1989 which, under § 19, came into force on 1 January 1990. Available online at http://dejure.org/gesetze/ProdHaftG Google Scholar

27 85/374/EEC, article 1.Google Scholar

28 Article 2.Google Scholar

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31 Article 3(2).Google Scholar

32 Article 3(3).Google Scholar

33 Article 3(3).Google Scholar

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36 National Blood Authority, note 35 above.Google Scholar

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45 Section 9, SGB VII.Google Scholar

46 Section 1 of the Berufskrankheitenverordnung.Google Scholar

47 Section 104, SGB VII.Google Scholar

48 Section 110, SGB VII.Google Scholar

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50 Section 113, SGB VII and section 195, BGB.Google Scholar

51 Section 823(2), BGB.Google Scholar

52 See, e.g., BGH judgment of 9 May 1995, ZIP 1995, p. 1094 (an English translation of which can be found at www.iuscomp.org/gla/judgments/tgcm/z950509.htm); BGH judgment of 2 February 1999; NJW 1999, p. 1028.Google Scholar

53 Section 199(2), BGB.Google Scholar

54 Palandt, Ergänzungsband, § 199 Rn. 42.Google Scholar

55 Section 842, BGB.Google Scholar

56 Sections 823 and 249, BGB.Google Scholar

57 Section 843, BGB.Google Scholar

58 Section 844, BGB.Google Scholar

59 Section 847, BGB.Google Scholar

60 For a general introduction to civil procedure in Germany, see H Koch and F Diedrich Civil Procedure in Germany (Kluwer Law International/Beck, München, 1998). The author has also written a briefing comparing the differences between civil litigation procedures in England and Germany, copies of which are available via email or post on request.Google Scholar

61 “Ermittlungen wegen Asbest”, Der Spiegel, 36/2001, 3 September 2001, available online, at cost, at www.spiegel.de/spiegel/0,1518,155951,00.html Google Scholar

62 See Janssen v Germany ECHR Application No. 23959/94, 20 December 2001, at para 28.Google Scholar

63 LG Kiel, judgment of 3 April 1995, case no. 9 O 436/92 (unreported).Google Scholar

64 SchlHOLG, decision of 22 August 1995, case no. 11 W 29/95, OLGR 1995, 29.Google Scholar