The High Court yesterday reduced by NT$663 million (US$22.7 million) the compensation to former Radio Corporation of America (RCA) employees who had sued the company over illnesses they say they developed due to exposure to toxic chemicals.
The court ruled that their claims lacked definitive cause-and-effect relationships between their work environment and their illnesses.
The ruling reduced the compensation for 1,112 former employees to NT$1.667 billion, down from the NT$2.33 billion that the Taipei District Court ordered RCA to pay in December 2019.
Photo: Tu Chien-jung, Taipei Times
Separate class-action lawsuits were filed against RCA, which operated in Taiwan from 1970 to 1990, on behalf of factory workers diagnosed with illnesses suspected to be from exposure to hazardous substances.
The proceedings, which began in 2002, is the largest class-action litigation in Taiwan’s history and involves the most workers seeking compensation against a business.
In the case against RCA and three affiliated companies — General Electric, Thomson Consumer Electronics (Bermuda) and Technicolor SA — the plaintiffs were divided into three groups: A for former employees who had died; B for those who had developed illnesses; and C for those who had no obvious illness.
Yesterday’s ruling was for Group B.
High Court judges cited a lack of a definitive cause-and-effect relationship linking exposure to chemicals when working at RCA factories in Hsinchu County and what was then Taoyuan County.
Data regarding chemical hazards are held by RCA and were not presented during the hearing, the judges said, adding that local water sources or other environmental factors might have been sources of chemicals that caused the illnesses.
Group representing the plaintiffs said that they are disappointed with the decision and plan to appeal.
The reduced amount is far less than the NT$7.3 billion they initially sought, the groups said.
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