In November 2008 we reported here that the English High Court had ruled that employers’ liability policies, however they are worded, are triggered by exposure to asbestos and not when, many years later, the tumour develops.
The appeal of that decision starts today in the English Court of Appeal before Lord Justice Rix, Lady Justice Smith and Lord Justice Stanley Burnton and is expected to last for three weeks. The insurers will argue that the trigger for pay-outs under their policies, if expressed to indemnify when the disease is “sustained”, is not the point of exposure to asbestos, but the later development of the condition.
