Written answers
Tuesday, 14 October 2008
Department of Enterprise, Trade and Employment
Compensation Tribunal
12:00 pm
Frank Feighan (Roscommon-South Leitrim, Fine Gael)
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Question 19: To ask the Tánaiste and Minister for Enterprise, Trade and Employment if she will establish a statutory compensation tribunal for ex-coal miners who have suffered injury and ill health due to the failure of various regulatory regimes to police the health and safety provisions as contained in the Mines and Quarries Act, 1965 (details supplied). [34663/08]
Billy Kelleher (Cork North Central, Fianna Fail)
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This matter has already been raised with a number of Departments, including my own, by the Joint Committee on Communications, Energy and Natural Resources. On the basis of the information available via the Committee, it would appear that this is a matter between the former miners and their former employers and insofar as the State may be concerned, a matter for further consideration under the social welfare code governing the State's disability and occupational illness benefit schemes.
The allegations regarding the policy of the provisions of the Mines and Quarries Act, 1965 are, to the best of my knowledge, unproven. In any event, the legal advice available to me, is that the mere existence of statutory regulation in a specific sector does not, of itself, impose any duty of care on the State in relation to the employees in that sector. The matter of compensation to former miners is, consequently, not a matter for my Department.
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