Nineteen men who worked at the drydocks from 1968 to 2003 have won a European court case for compensation over asbestos exposure. File photo: Matthew Mirabelli

A European Court judgment granting moral damages to 19 dockyard workers for asbestos exposure could encourage victims to sue the government for financial compensation, according to lawyers.

The victims would have to institute proceedings for material damages and prove their cases individually.

The European Court of Human Rights’ ruling did not automatically mean they would get compensation, lawyers Veronique Dalli and Stefano Filletti agreed.

Last week, the European Court found that the government breached the right to life and the right to respect for private and family life when it failed to take measures to ensure the safety of the 19 employees who were exposed to asbestos.

Asbestos is a mineral fibre used for insulation and a fire retardant, found especially in ships.

The fibres are too small to be visible but can accumulate in the lungs if inhaled.

The domestic courts cannot fob off the victims by telling them they have to be content with purely material damages

The workers, who all suffered from lung problems, were exposed to asbestos between 1968 and 2003. Since then three of them passed away.

The European Court ordered the government to pay the workers, or their heirs, a total of €226,000 in moral damages for breach of human rights.

“The judgment noted that, if the checks were in place, these people wouldn’t be in this situation.

“It means that someone is answerable for damages and this can serve as a motivation for victims to seek further compensation,” Dr Dalli said.

Dr Filletti added that each case would have to be examined on its own merits.

“This judgment does not give guarantees. There is no express route to compensation because each individual would have to prove his case,” he said, adding that the government could still choose to appeal the decision.

Asked about this, a government spokeswoman replied: “It would be too rash to give a definitive answer because, as in all ECHR judgments, these have to be scrutinised in detail before it is decided whether to ask for leave to appeal.

“Given the subject matter, the government will only ask for such leave if there are grave reasons.”

The dockyard workers in question can now go to the Maltese courts to sue for financial damages.

Their lawyer, Juliette Galea, is still studying the best way forward since the European Court comes with a complex legal twist, which raises questions as to where exactly such a case is to be filed.

Her 19 clients had originally resorted to the European Court after three Maltese judges sitting in the Constitutional Court upheld previous judgments ruling that their request for damages should have been filed in a civil court not a constitutional one.

Maltese law states that material damages can only be given by the Civil Court while moral damages are allocated by the Constitutional Court.

Before filing a constitutional case, a person has to first go through the Civil Court. The Constitutional Court threw out the case on those grounds.

However, the European Court disagreed with that decision, noted Giovanni Bonello, a former judge of the European Court of Human Rights.

“An action in the Civil Court was an ‘inadequate remedy’ because the Civil Court could not award moral damages, which are indispensable to compensate for pain and suffering when the right to life has been violated. The Constitutional Court should award both material and moral damages,” he said while explaining the European court’s rationale.

“The European Court of Human Rights… confirmed that, when the right to life is at stake, the domestic courts cannot fob off the victims by telling them that they have to be content with purely material damages,” he continued.

He added that the judgment reasserted a trend in European Court case law to the effect that, where health issues were concerned, the State must not only refrain from damaging workers’ health but had a positive duty to have in place all measures that safeguarded and promoted their health.

In this case, the State was found to be at fault for not doing enough to protect workers from the known lethal effect of asbestos, he said.