Instruct: Given a question, retrieve documents that can help answer the question.
Query: When did the Armley asbestos disaster first begin?
The contamination was the result of the activities of a local asbestos factory, part of the Turner & Newall (T&N) group (often referred to by the name of its founders, J. W. Roberts Ltd.) and occurred between the end of the 19th century and 1959 when the factory eventually closed.[2] At its peak the factory had 250 employees. At least 300 former employees are believed to have died from asbestos-related illnesses, and a number of cancer deaths in the Armley area were traced to the factory in 1988 as a result of an investigation by the Yorkshire Evening Post.[4] The estate was found to have the highest incidence in the country of mesothelioma.[5] As the interval between exposure and diagnosis can be up to 50 years the number of further deaths which may occur due to the factory's emissions or residual dust since its closure cannot be predicted.[2][6]
On 20 July 1982, Yorkshire Television broadcast the documentary Alice - A Fight For Life, predominantly the story of Alice Jefferson, who had worked at the Acre Mill asbestos factory in Hebden Bridge for just nine months when she was 17 years old. Thirty years later she was diagnosed with mesothelioma and given only six months to live. The documentary was also an "exposé on the workings of the asbestos industry." Its broadcast resulted in £60 million being knocked off T&N's share price overnight, headlines in the national newspapers, and the setting up of a government enquiry. Within ten days the government had halved the legal limit for asbestos dust in the workplace.[13] In 1988 Yorkshire Television picked up the Yorkshire Evening Post story and produced a second critical investigation focusing on the pattern of deaths in Armley, and contradicting the government's reasons for refusing an inquiry.[3] Called Too Close to Home,[14] it was broadcast as part of the First Tuesday documentary series on 6 December 1988.
June Hancock's story formed the subject of a play, Dust, by Kenneth F. Yates, which was performed in Armley and at the West Yorkshire Playhouse in July 2009.[35]
It was not uncommon until the factory's closure for children to be seen playing in the dust in the streets and the local school's playground, making 'snowballs' which were thrown in ignorance of the danger they posed. Others used the thick layer of dust in the playground to mark out hopscotch squares.[4][9][10]
Taylor met with John Battle, then the Member of Parliament for Leeds West, in 1987 to present his findings, and Battle raised the matter in a House of Commons debate. Along with Leeds City Council, he called for a public inquiry into the deaths at Armley, but the incumbent Conservative government under Margaret Thatcher rejected the request, on the grounds that it "would cause needless concern, that it was impossible to discover what had happened at Roberts, and that no one could then have imagined that the dust could have harmed residents."[3][9][12] Battle submitted to the House: "I cannot believe that those who owned and ran Roberts can have gone in and out without seeing the dust everywhere on the surrounding streets and pavements. If they knew that their workers within had to be protected from the asbestos dust, how could they have ignored the position of their neighbours who lived with that dust outside? It was not rendered neutral or innocuous as it left their premises. If they knew, why did they knowingly continue to ask not only their employees but local residents for a generation to pay the price with their lives for the profits of continued asbestos production? ...Should not the company be responsible for that deadly legacy? The Armley asbestos tragedy cannot remain private and hidden because it is not yet over."[9]
The Armley asbestos disaster is an ongoing health issue originating in Armley, a suburb of Leeds, West Yorkshire, England. Described by Dr. Geoffrey Tweedale as a "social disaster", it involved the contamination with asbestos dust of an area consisting of around 1,000 houses in the Armley Lodge area of the city.[2][3]
Leeds City Council commissioned a report into the deaths from the Department of Public Health at the University of Leeds. The council also began a survey of some of the houses in the neighbourhood, looking for residual contamination. Asbestos dust was found to be present in the roofing, cellars and window sashes. As a result, a warning letter was sent to all residents informing them of the possibility of asbestos contamination in their homes and the need for specialised decontamination. When asked, the Minister for Housing and Planning, Sir George Young, responded that the government would not provide financial assistance to the home owners or the council to pay for decontamination, as this "would not be a justifiable use of public funds."[15] In further tests between 1998 - 2001 the council surveyed 364 houses adjacent to Midland Works. Residual asbestos contamination was found in 363 of the properties tested.[1] As of November 2008, a further 610 properties had been tested and found to contain residual asbestos dust, and decontaminated at a cost of £9.3 million.[16]
Hancock said after the ruling: "The money won't do me much good, but there's no other way they can pay. The only way they can answer for what they did is money."[26] She died on 19 July 1997. A charity, the June Hancock Mesothelioma Research Fund, was established shortly after her death to support victims of mesothelioma and mesothelioma research projects.
In Leeds, England the Armley asbestos disaster involved several court cases against Turner & Newall where local residents who contracted mesothelioma demanded compensation because of the asbestos pollution from the company's factory. One notable case was that of June Hancock, who contracted the disease in 1993 and died in 1997.
During the 1970s the incidence of mesothelioma in former workers at the factory began to rise, but cases were also being found in people who had never worked for T&N, although they had lived in the vicinity of Midland Works or had relatives who were former employees.[3] In 1987 Richard Taylor, a journalist with the Yorkshire Evening Post, began checking through the coroner's court reports, examining death certificates and interviewing relatives and neighbours of the deceased.[3][9] As a result, Taylor was able to demonstrate a pattern "of an incredibly high incidence of mesothelioma deaths in Armley around the Roberts factory."[9] Philip Sanderson Gill, the coroner, agreed with the findings, and said: "It was only as a trend over a number of years that a more precise picture appeared. I have very few other cases from other areas of Leeds. It is significant that virtually all the cases we have come from that area." The Yorkshire Evening Post produced a series of articles about the ongoing contamination and disease, which they dubbed the "Armley Asbestos Tragedy".[2]
When John Major became Prime Minister in November 1990, he gave Young the role of Minister for Housing and Planning. Shortly after, during an interview for BBC Radio 4's "Today" programme in June 1991, Young described the homeless as "the people you step over when you come out of the opera". In 1992 when asked during parliamentary discussions of the Armley Asbestos Disaster for financial assistance in surveying local housing in the Armley area for residual asbestos, Young responded that the government would not provide financial assistance to the home owners or the council to pay for decontamination as this "would not be a justifiable use of public funds".
Documents discovered by lawyers in the 1990s revealed that in 1979 T&N were also notified of asbestos contamination in a house in Aviary Road that had once been part of the Midland Works after the city's Public Analyst found asbestos in an attic and garden, and an internal T&N memo about this stated "... presumably it is reasonable to suppose that adjoining properties might also be involved." Leeds City Council did not inform the public. T&N paid for the decontamination of the property in Aviary Road but "secured an understanding that 'any reference to the proximity of the buildings to the old JW Roberts factory will now be omitted from the Land Registry Records'" and all such references were then removed by Leeds City Council. They then began to prepare "dossiers on 'likely attackers' and journalists with a 'special interest' in asbestos."[8] In 1992, when asked to comment about contamination in Aviary Road T&N said: "T&N has not been made aware of any evidence linking that asbestos with JW Roberts's former factory."[8]
In 1974, after reviewing company documents about Midland Works, a T&N public relations officer wrote: "I hope very much indeed that we are never called upon to discuss Armley in the public arena."[3] In 1978, however, Leeds City Council informed T&N that the factory was still "badly contaminated" with asbestos, with dust found in the basement, lift shaft, roof, ventilation shafts and beneath the floors. Hessian sacks containing asbestos fibre were still present, and the yard was filled with 'a few hundred tonnes' of blue asbestos waste mixed with soil. R. D. Lunt, T&N's Safety and Environment manager, wrote of the factory basement: "Every nook and cranny has asbestos fibre in it".[8] T&N contributed £15,000 towards the clean-up of the factory, and claimed they were doing so out of "a moral, not a legal responsibility" to do so.[3][8] The surrounding houses and buildings were not included in this operation, and Leeds City Council and T&N "agreed to keep the whole matter 'low-key' if approached by the media", while a T&N internal memo stated "The Principal Inspector of Factories and the Assistant Director of Environmental Health are anxious to play this down and have given us considerable support."[8]
The company operated a plant in Leeds where the Armley asbestos disaster occurred and which only closed in 1959.
In 1993, Sir Colin Hope stated: "...[T]he factory in question was not owned or operated by this Company. It was owned and operated by a company known as J.W. Roberts Limited ("JWR"). JWR ceased production at that factory in 1958/59, and vacated and sold the premises shortly thereafter. Although JWR continued in business for some time after leaving the Armley site, the company ceased to trade over twenty years ago... I am aware of the various comments and allegations that have been made about JWR's Armley factory, particularly as the source of the contamination to which you refer. Those comments and allegations are not accepted."[17] In the Commons, John Battle responded that he was in possession of correspondence "in which the same T&N plc sought to convince Her Majesty's Inspector of Taxes that, for tax purposes, J.W. Roberts of Armley was still in business as an integral part of T&N and should be taken into account when calculating tax reductions. Is it too cynical to suggest that JWR is counted in only for profits, but discounted when it comes to its responsibility for local lives?"[17]
T&N's chairman Sir Colin Hope, writing on 25 October 1989, claimed that after the company vacated and sold the premises in 1959, it had ceased to keep any records relating to the operation, that it held no archived records, and what records might still exist would be "extremely scanty" (sic) and "largely confined to basic employee record cards."[3] John Battle MP addressed the House of Commons on 8 July 1992 regarding the difficulties faced in mounting a legal case against T&N: "Basically, it is an attempt legally to prove negligence in the face of foreseeable likelihood that harm would occur as a result of causing or permitting asbestos dust to permeate the atmosphere in or around the factory premises in Canal Road, Armley, between 1925 and 1958... The legal test is whether the company knew that the dust could cause serious or possibly fatal injury to those living in the 840 houses nearby who work in the local workplaces or who attend the Armley Clock school... I have reason to believe that the company and other sources, medical and environmental, did have that sort of data, and still do. The difficulty lies in seeking it out - discovering it - and, especially, forcing the company to disclose all that it knew and knows."[15]
As a result of the ruling, T&N accepted liability with a further 60 claimants from Armley. The full amount of compensation was never paid out as T&N eventually filed for bankruptcy. There were still hundreds of outstanding cases relating to dust emitted from Midland Works, but plaintiffs' solicitors were informed that as a result of the bankruptcy, all legal actions against T&N and its subsidiaries would be stayed.
In 1995 O'Connor was awarded the Freedom of Information Award in the UK, presented by Tony Blair, in recognition of "his remarkable efforts to supply British victims of asbestos diseases with documents needed for their compensation claims."[18]
Further claims of compensation for other victims eventually commenced in 2007 when Federal-Mogul emerged from Chapter 11 bankruptcy. By that time, just £91 million was available for T&N's worldwide non-U.S. asbestos liabilities for the next 40 years. Successful applicants receive as little as 17% of the value of their claims.
T&N had conceded before the trial that Hancock's and Margereson's illnesses were caused by asbestos from the factory, but any compensation depended on proving that the company knew or should have known the dangers the dust could cause.[22] Three months after the hearing ended Mr. Justice Holland handed down a written judgment, finding for the plaintiffs, and awarded damages of £65,000 to June Hancock and £50,000 to Evelyn Margereson. The judge ruled that the defendant was liable on the grounds that the risks of asbestos dust exposure had been known by the defendant since 1933 and it was foreseeable that children allowed to play in the vicinity of the factory would be exposed to the risk of pulmonary disease. This was a landmark decision, extending as it did the duty of care beyond factory employees to those outside a factory's walls.[23]
Rachel Reeves, elected as MP for Leeds West in May 2010, raised the issue of justice for the victims of the asbestos disaster and their families in a series of questions in Parliament. In her maiden speech she said: "There is a real concern that the coalition will use the country's financial deficit as an excuse to unfairly target working people, particularly those who have been left dealing with the devastating effects of exposure to asbestos. With the backing of trade unions and support groups a huge amount of effort has gone into making sure that the voices of asbestos victims and their families are heard by Government and as a result a number of important assurances were made to them at the end of the last Parliament. It's vital those commitments are not reneged upon to the detriment of thousands of asbestos victims across the country."[34]
J. W. Roberts Ltd. was founded in Armley in 1874 as a textile producer, primarily working with cotton, hemp and jute. By 1906, its factory on Canal Road, known as the Midland Works, specialised in the manufacture of asbestos insulation mattresses for steam locomotive boilers and is believed to have been one of only two factories in the world at the time which processed blue asbestos.[3] In 1920 it merged with Turner Brothers Asbestos Company Ltd., Newalls Insulation Company Ltd., and the Washington Chemical Company Ltd., to form Turner & Newall Ltd., which in 1925 became a public company.[7] T&N's rapid growth has been attributed to a product called "Sprayed Limpet Asbestos", developed in the Armley works in 1931. This was made by mixing raw asbestos with water and cement, the resulting slurry being spray applied to the surface to be insulated, creating a cheap sound- and fireproof coating. Sprayed Limpet Asbestos generated huge profits for T&N who exported the product to 60 countries where it was applied to a wide range of buildings including schools, churches and theatres and the London Underground.[8] The factory at Armley closed in 1959.
From the 1870s until 1956, Armley was home to the J W Roberts asbestos mattress and boiler lining factory. This facility exposed residents to asbestos fibres and resulted in a mesothelioma cancer cluster which persists to this day. One of the victims, June Hancock, launched a court action against Turner & Newall, the company that owned the J W Roberts' factory in 1993. Although the court case was successful, corporate restructuring had, as of 2005, avoided the case being settled. Hancock's story was the subject of a play, "Dust", by Kenneth F. Yates, performed in Armley and at the West Yorkshire Playhouse in July 2009.
T&N applied for leave to appeal in December 1995, and submissions were heard in March 1996 by Lord Justices Russell, Saville and Otton. William Woodward QC, for T&N, submitted that it could never be known when and where a person developed mesothelioma and it could not be determined which particular dust particle produced mesothelioma. On these grounds, T&N should not be held responsible for cancer which could have arisen from asbestos dust produced by another company.[27] Lord Justice Russell responded that the line that had to be drawn was where, outside the factory walls, the risk of personal injury became less than a real possibility and said "It is not a very attractive argument for the factory owner to agree that mountains of asbestos dust were created but these cases of cancer were not the result of that."[28]
In 1998, the company acquired the Automotive Products division of Cooper Industries, with brands including Anco wiper blades, Champion ignition, MOOG chassis, and Wagner and Blazer lighting. It also acquired Cooper's Abex Friction products business, which included asbestos-containing products. That same year, Federal-Mogul acquired Turner & Newall, a building materials company based in Manchester, UK. Turner & Newall was one of the world's largest manufacturers of asbestos-related products, including those made with blue crocidolite asbestos mined in South Africa. Turner & Newall was responsible for the Armley asbestos disaster in Leeds, UK. After the acquisition, Federal-Mogul set aside approximately $2.1 billion to cover asbestos-related claims but that amount provide insufficient. The large number of products liability claims that came with the Turner & Newall acquisition were largely responsible for Federal-Mogul's federal Chapter 11 bankruptcy filing in 2002.