Will natural sympathy for asbestos sufferers trump policy concerns? Elizabeth Carley reports
Asbestos litigation to date has tended to focus on injury to industrial workers, as it was in industrial settings that exposure was greatest. But much lower levels of exposure can cause injury or death. There is increasing potential for litigation arising from lower level exposure in non industrial settings, for example in schools. How will the courts grapple with this? The recent Court of Appeal decision in Williams v University of Birmingham [2011] EWCA Civ 1242, [2011] All ER (D) 25 (Nov) highlights some of the issues.
Williams
Williams concerned low level exposure to asbestos and whether reasonable foresight of harm is necessary for a finding of breach of duty. Mr Williams was a student at Birmingham University. In 1974 he undertook a series of physics experiments in a basement tunnel containing asbestos lagged pipes. At trial, the university accepted that Williams had been exposed to low levels of asbestos. They argued, however, that this exposure was not a breach of duty as it was so limited that they could not
