Asbestos Bill Dies in Senate

The Senate bill that would have established a $140 billion fund to compensate victims of asbestos was defeated last night because of budgetary questions. The vote to override the budget objection failed on a 58 to 41 vote.

Majority leader Bill Frist had said he would not try to bring the bill back later in the year, but one Senator who missed the vote because hiw wife was sick said he would have voted yes, opening the door for possible passage later.

What this means for those who have been poisioned by asbestos is that the courts are still the only way to get restitution. It’s estimated that 10,000 people a year die from asbestos related illnesses, but about 60 percent of the money in asbestos court settlements goes to lawyers instead of victims.

Still, many liberal Democrats said the bill did not go far enough to compensate victims and would serve only as a way to bail out companies that should be held liable for the damage. Some Republicans hesitated to create what they thought would become another entitlement program.

(Source: New York Times

Will the senate asbestos bill pass?

Investor’s Business Daily (via Yahoo) is reporting that the asbestos bill will have its day, but its chances of passing are slim.

After more than two years of wrangling, the Senate is set to vote…on a major $140 billion bill to resolve the asbestos litigation crisis. But insiders say the bill’s chances are iffy at best.

[…]

Of the four major stakeholders that would be affected by the bill — business, insurers, trial lawyers and big labor — only business is backing the current version. One union, United Auto Workers, has broken ranks to endorse it.

It has scant Democratic support and many conservative Republicans have also expressed serious qualms about it. Passage is going to require a lot of arm-twisting.

[…]

Among the concerns are whether $140 billion is enough and if the cases will return to the courts if the fund runs out. A Congressional Budget Office study indicated the fund could fall $10 billion short.

[…]

Insurers are concerned that creating a fund will only cause more people to file suits before the trust is up and running. Trial lawyers don’t like it since it would limit fees in what has been a very lucrative field.

Meanwhile, in Japan, things are going a little more smoothly. Japan’s Cabinet recently approved a draft of a bill that would “compensate people suffering from asbestos-related health problems.” The Japanese government “is considering one-time payments of 2.6 million yen ($22,000) to any family that has suffered a death. Benefits would also apply to people not covered by industrial accident insurance.”

Settlement reached in WV asbestos suit

According to AP writer Allison Barker, WVU will pay former and current employees as part of an asbestos class action settlement:

West Virginia University has reached a settlement in a class-action lawsuit affecting up to 5,600 former and current employees who may have been exposed to asbestos, the school announced Tuesday.

As part of the proposed settlement, WVU will institute and pay for a medical surveillance program to be conducted for 20 years. WVU also agreed to pay $1 million to cover potential claims and attorney fees.

A judge must approve the agreement before it becomes final. A hearing is scheduled for Dec. 22.

University employees sued in 2000 and sought medical monitoring for potential asbestos-related health problems as a result of working in university buildings containing asbestos insulation.

The workers, including professors, custodians, secretaries and other staff, alleged that asbestos in campus buildings put them at an increased risk of cancer.

The university said in a statement that the agreement had been reached in the “spirit of compromise.”

“WVU maintains that all standard, recognized practices for asbestos removal have been followed over the years, and that the general population of employees, through routine monitoring of buildings and air samplings, remain safe from any harmful effects of asbestos-containing materials,” the university said.

Until the 1970s, asbestos was universally prized for its resistance to fire and heat. Since then, the medical community has warned that asbestos fibers, when inhaled, can cause such illnesses as mesothelioma, a rare and inoperable form of lung cancer. It also causes asbestosis, an irreversible scarring of the lungs, and other lung ailments.

Asbestos bill meeting next Thursday

Here’s the latest on the asbestos bill, from TheHill.com:

An upcoming Senate Judiciary Committee hearing on asbestos-injury-liability reform will give Chairman Arlen Specter (R-Pa.) a chance to counter a critical report about his bill and rejuvenate his effort to move the legislation forward.

The hearing, scheduled for next Thursday, could be viewed as a response to a recent report by the economics-consulting firm Bates White, which concluded that Specter’s proposed trust fund to pay asbestos claims will go bankrupt.

[…]

Specter’s decision to call a hearing on a bill his committee has already marked is a break with the Senate’s usual practice. He could be seeking to repair any damage the Bates White report may have inflicted on his legislation’s future.

If the trust fund were to run dry, the legislation would allow claimants to file lawsuits. Politically, however, it could prove difficult for Congress to allow a trust fund to disappear. The federal government could be left to foot the bill itself or squeeze additional money from the private sector.

Specter’s hearing will include analysts who will no doubt impugn the Bates White study, which the conservative American Legislative Exchange Council commissioned. Other independent reports have drawn more optimistic conclusions about the fiscal soundness of the fund.

[…]

Specter originally scheduled the hearing for Monday. Sources said he moved it back amid complaints that committee members and others would sparsely attend a hearing on a Monday — a day Senate committees rarely convene.

For the entire article, visit Judiciary panel to revisit asbestos by Jeffrey Young at TheHill.com.

Latest on the senate asbestos bill

Have you been wondering what’s going on with the senate asbestos bill?

Nov. 2 — The U.S. Congress is putting off a series of contentious issues until 2006, an election year when lawmakers may find it difficult to pass them.

Congress has up to six weeks left in this legislative year, and its docket is full with work on spending bills for federal agencies, responding to the Gulf Coast hurricanes and considering the nomination of Appellate Judge Samuel Alito to the Supreme Court.

This is from an articled entitled Congress Puts Off Tough Issues Until 2006, Imperiling Prospects from Bloomberg.com. Here’s what the author had to say about the asbestos fund:

Other issues, such as a proposal to end litigation over asbestos by creating a $140 billion trust fund to compensate those sickened by the substance, will likely require extended negotiations to reach agreements that can be approved by Congress.

Matthew Webb, a lobbyist for the Washington-based U.S. Chamber of Commerce, the nation’s largest business organization, said companies want to see the asbestos plan pushed through the Senate this year. Payments from the trust would be financed by companies that made asbestos products, such as Chicago-based USG Corp., the world’s largest wallboard maker, and their insurers.

“Companies are losing tons of money with the litigation,” Webb said. “We’re hopeful they’re going to move it forward as soon as they possibly can.”

Republican Senator George Allen of Virginia said stem cell research shouldn’t have a prime slot on the lawmakers’ agenda.

“If nothing happens on stem cells, it’s not the end of the world,” he said. “Research on embryonic stem cells will go on, financed by states and the private sector.” A resolution of the asbestos issue, Allen said, “is a must-do.”

Closer to a decision?

Senate Leaders Narrow Differences on Asbestos

Excerpt:

U.S. Senate leaders have narrowed their differences over a proposed fund to compensate asbestos victims and are talking about a fund of between $131 billion and $141 billion, aides and others close to the talks said on Friday.

Senate Democratic Leader Tom Daschle of South Dakota proposed a fund of $141 billion, a Senate Democratic aide told Reuters. Sources close to the talks say Senate Republican Leader Bill Frist suggested a fund of about $131 billion, although Frist’s staff has not confirmed that number.

The leaders are trying to agree on the outlines of an asbestos fund that could then be written into legislation.

Class Action Alternatives

Recovering Financially From Mesothelioma

Disability Insurance
Disability claims may be filed if one has such insurance either privately or through an employer.

Social Security Disability
Disability claims can be filed with the federal social security system.

Worker’s Compensation
Only if asbestos exposure can be linked to a particular job-site can a worker’s compensation claim be filed against an employer. It is also possible that a worker’s compensation claim will conflict with the pursuit of other legal remedies, so it is advisable to consult with an attorney before pursuing this or any other avenue of monetary recovery.

Legal Assistance
Mesothelioma lawsuits are divided into two categories - one, where the person suffering from mesothelioma is living (a personal injury case) and the second, where the person with mesothelioma has died (wrongful death case), and the plaintiff is a spouse, relative and/or representative of the deceased person’s estate.

When the person who would normally be the plaintiff is deceased, an alternate individual (usually the spouse or a close relative) stands in as the plaintiff, and the injuries claimed include the loss of life itself. The most important part of a wrongful death case is locating persons who worked with the plaintiff to provide testimony that the deceased individual would have provided regarding work history and asbestos exposure.

Sen. Specter says no asbestos vote soon

The latest on the asbestos bill…

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A bill to create a $140 billion asbestos compensation fund is not expected to come up on the Senate floor before the August recess, the legislation’s co-author, Sen. Arlen Specter, said on Wednesday.

“It does not look at this point as if the majority leader is going to find time for it,” Specter said, referring to Sen. Bill Frist, a Tennessee Republican. Specter, chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, spoke at a news conference that was called to discuss President Bush’s nomination to the Supreme Court, Judge John Roberts.

The Senate’s month-long August recess begins “at the end of next week.”

Asbestos lawyers’ scams

Here’s the start of an interesting Washington Examiner article about asbestos laywers’ scams:

A Supreme Court vacancy has forced the Senate Judiciary Committee to delay other business, including a bill that would create a trust fund to compensate victims of asbestos-related illness. In the meantime, trial lawyers continue the feeding frenzy that this bill could halt.

New light was recently shed on their brazen scam by Lester Brickman, a law professor at the Cardozo School of Law at Yeshiva University. Writing in the Hofstra Law Review, Brickman details ethical lapses of a plaintiff’s bar run amok. Grab a sick bag and we’ll give you an overview.

Through 2004, about 845,000 people had filed claims in asbestos cases, with 60 to 70 defendants named in each case. About 90 percent of claimants are unimpaired by any illness. How, then, do they become litigants? Most are recruited through advertising and massive, assembly-line screening operations designed solely to collect evidence for asbestos lawsuits.

To attract class-action prospects, trial lawyers run hard-sell ads in mass media, send out reams of letters and maintain shrill Internet sites. Milliondollarlungs.com, for example, opens with this measured pitch: “Find out if YOU have MILLION DOLLAR LUNGS! If you worked with or around asbestos prior to the year 1972, you could be entitled to millions of dollars … yet you might not know it.”

It gets better. Check it out here.

Asbestos Update

Here’s a quick asbestos update from the St. Clair Record:

Word from the U.S. Capitol is that the long debated federal asbestos litigation reform measure will– finally– start moving toward passage in July.

At issue has been who will pay into a proposed $140 billion ‘Asbestos Trust Fund’ intended to replace litigation, and how much. The insurance industry has reservations about its share, reportedly $46 billion worth.

U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Arlen Specter (R-Pennsylvania) is aiming for a floor vote after the July 4th holiday.

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