In a first for China, a court has awarded compensation to 192 farmers who developed lung disease while employed as tunnel diggers, an official newspaper said yesterday.
The landmark ruling comes as Chinese legislators are planning to approve a new law to stem the toll of work-related accidents and diseases in China's often chronically unsafe factories and workplaces.
The class-action lawsuit filed by 192 farmers in the eastern province of Zhejiang was China's first seeking compensation for lung disease, the China Daily said.
They were hired in 1993 to dig a highway tunnel in China's northeast, the newspaper said. In their suit, the farmers claimed that the two engineering companies that hired them took no steps to protect them from silicon dust in the tunnel, the newspaper said.
Ten of the farmers have already died from lung disease, it said. In all, 196 were sickened and all but four of them filed suit five months ago against the companies and a man identified by the China Daily only by his name, Chen Yixiao.
An official at the court which ruled Wednesday that all 192 farmers be compensated said that Chen headed one of the engineering firms. The official, reached by telephone, gave only his surname, Pan.
The court, in the Zhejiang coastal city of Wenzhou, awarded 226,800 yuan (US$27,400) for each death, the China Daily said.
The sickest surviving farmers were awarded 389,600 yuan (US$47,050). The smallest award was for 38,960 yuan (US$4,700) -- still more than many Chinese farmers earn in 10 years.
The China Daily did not give a total for the compensation awarded. But it appeared to be considerably lower than the 200 million yuan (US$24.1 million) that earlier state media reports had said the farmers were seeking.
Industrial safety has suffered in China's pursuit of high economic growth.
Tens of thousands of people are killed each year in mine explosions, factory fires and building collapses. Often, farmers are employed as workers but given little or no training.
Human rights campaigners and labor activists say China's communist government is partly to blame because it does not allow workers to set up independent trade unions to protect their rights.
Chinese lawmakers meeting in Beijing are expected to give final approval Saturday for a new law that will require employers to do more to prevent industrial accidents and diseases, the newspaper said Wednesday.
The law will require employers to provide occupational health facilities and accident insurance for employees, the newspaper said. It gave no details.
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