Compensation Bill [Lords]

I am not sure whether my hon. Friend made the point that he wanted to make because, in the case of the equal pay claims, the NUM left plenty in the filing cabinet and there are plenty more that the UDM under-settled. The canteen workers, the cleaners and the equal pay claims constitute a separate issue, into which I do not want to stray now. I want to refer to some of the claims handlers and what they said. Union and General Services Ltd boldly stated that it would ““assist”” with"““the costs associated with the Claim””" and took a large cheque. Although Robinson King solicitors lost a week ago at the solicitors disciplinary tribunal, they still refuse to pay people back. Four out of the six cases that went to the solicitors disciplinary tribunal involved my constituents. We are considering sums of money that approach £4,000 which was wrongly deducted. There is some dispute about whether Union and General Services Ltd received the money that it was supposed to get for funding the claim. It did not fund the claim and the solicitors conspired with it. That is why the Bill is vital—it is also vital that we get it right. P. R. and Associates is still in existence. I have an example of its ““form of agreement”” for ““common law claims”” for"““help, advice, instruction, representation, travelling costs, and administration… on pursuing my Common Law Claim.””" However, the claim to which it refers is not a common law claim. It went through the claims handling agreement. If it had been a common law claim, which entailed a risk, it would be perfectly fair for a union or non-union organisation to charge a percentage or a fee, provided that it was transparent, because it bore the risk. The scandal of the miners’ claim is that there was no risk. We are not being irrational. We do not say that people—whoever they are—should bear risk for no reason or no reward when there is transparency. However, when people have been deceived, they should get justice and their money back. Perhaps the most astonishing example is that of Industrial Diseases Compensation Ltd. Its agreement form states:"““The Company shall pay… all of the cost of The Claim to include legal fees and medical examination costs””." It did not pay a penny. It went through a solicitor on its panel and through the claims handling agreement and did not pay a penny. Its form has a clause 6(i), which outlines what happens if the"““Claimant deliberately misled The Company””." I shall end with that. The Bill and the law should deal with cases when the company has deliberately misled the claimant. We must ensure that everyone has access to justice. That is crucial for that minority who did not go through solicitors with miners’ claims but went only through Vendside Ltd. They have no redress through consumer complaints to the Law Society and the system that I believe now works well, from evidence in the past three or four months. The minority who went only through Vendside Ltd should automatically and immediately have full consumer rights so that they can complain the moment the measure receives Royal Assent.