Courts order state to compensate children of Drydocks worker €30,000 over asbestos poisoning

The First Hall of the Civil Court in its Constitutional jurisdiction yesterday ordered the Chief Medical Officer of the state as well the Attorney General to pay €30,000 in compensation for moral damages to the family of a pipe worker who died due to exposure to asbestos during the course of his work.

Andrew Psaila, the unfortunate worker who suffered asbestos poisoning, worked at the Malta Drydocks for almost 30 years. He began working at the Drydocks in 1959 until he died of cancer in 1988. It was found that he became sick with cancer exclusively due to exposure to asbestos.

This led to his children instituting Constitutional proceedings, asking the courts to declare that their father’s fundamental right to life had been breached, and to liquidate the damages they suffered through the loss of their father.

Mr Justice Joseph McKeon, presiding over the case, held that the right to life – as guaranteed by the Maltese Constitution as well as the European Convention for Human Rights (ECHR) – does not just pertain to prohibiting the removal of live but also obliges the state to take steps in preventing any threat towards life.

The Courts concluded that in this particular case, the state failed to update in a timely manner laws to keep pace with scientific knowledge about the danger of asbestos.