Dockyard store worker ‘exposed to deadly dust’

AWESTCOUNTRY lawyer is probing the historic use of asbestos in Plymouth’s dockyard after a former store worker fell seriously ill.

Liz Makin, senior solicitor in the Wolferstans Solicitors specialist asbestos team, wants to hear from laggers who worked in the yard’s asbestos store, after being instructed to bring an action by a former employee.

Storeman Peter Jeffery, who lives in Saltash in Cornwall, was diagnosed with asbestosis at the end of 2019. He worked at Devonport dockyard from 1960 to 1975, years before it was privatised, but, unlike many with asbestos disease, he was not generally on board the ships being refitted.

Instead, he worked in the asbestos stores for about three years in the late 1960s, where he claims it was exposed to significant levels of asbestos dust.

Ms Makin said that day-to-day and throughout his whole shift, Mr Jeffery said he would be exposed to asbestos dust. Cardboard boxes containing asbestos products such as pre-formed insulation were often broken when delivered to the stores, Mr Jeffery said.

He recalled the bed of the delivery lorry being “thick with asbestos dust” and claims he handled sacks of asbestos powder and swept asbestos dust from the floor.

His main job was to serve members of the lagging team with asbestos products when they came into the stores. Of all Devonport workers, the laggers were usually those exposed to the highest levels of dangerous asbestos dust, Ms Makin said.

She said the laggers would strip off old, crumbly insulation from pipes, machinery and other fittings all around the ships and submarines.

“They would come to Peter’s store covered in white dust and he served them with asbestos products or powder, which they would then use to reinsulate pipes on board,” she said.

“The MoD knew of the dangers of breathing in even small quantities of dust, but did nothing to warn him, or provide him with a mask, or other protective equipment, or safe working practices.”

A new, much safer store was built in the 1970s.

Ms Makin said the MoD’s defence to a claim centres on whether Mr Jeffery caused or contributed to his illness by failing to report that he was working with asbestos or to use protection provided, or to tell the ministry that protection was required.

Ms Makin said: “Allegations that Peter was in any way to blame for his own misfortune are, frankly, preposterous. It was the MoD’s job as the employer to protect him.”