The Social Security (Industrial Injuries) (Miscellaneous Amendments) Regulations 1997

Explanatory Note

(This note is not part of the Regulations)

These Regulations amend the Social Security (Adjudication) Regulations 1995 and the Social Security (Industrial Injuries) (Prescribed Diseases) Regulations 1985 by—

(a) modifying the provisions for the reference of diagnosis, recrudescence and disablement questions to an adjudicating medical authority;

(b) providing that entitlement may arise from the first day a person suffers from a loss of faculty due to diffuse mesothelioma;

(c) amending the occupational prescription in respect of disease number D3 (diffuse mesothelioma) to include exposure to asbestos, asbestos dust and admixtures of asbestos at levels above those found in the environment at large;

(d) changing the description of diseases D8 (primary carcinoma of the lung etc.) and D9 (bilateral diffuse pleural thickening) so as to require either unilateral or bilateral diffuse pleural thickening extending to a defined thickness and measured in a specified manner in either or both lungs;

(e) changing the description of disease D12 (chronic bronchitis and emphysema) so as to cease to require evidence of an X-ray and amending the occupational prescription to include periods of incapacity while engaged in the occupation of working underground in a coal mine in the specified period of service;

(f) making consequential and drafting amendments.

A full compliance cost assessment of the effect these Regulations have on costs of business is available from the House of Commons and House of Lords Libraries. Copies can be obtained by post from the Department of Social Security, Deregulation Unit, Adelphi, John Adam Street, London WC2 6HT.