Dying man awaits cash verdict

Jack and Lyn Soeters, who have been fighting for an ACC lump sum for his asbestos-caused cancer. Picture / Amos Chapple

Jack Soeters knew his lungs were in trouble when he was left breathless and near collapse on a family outing near Rotorua in April last year.

"I was ahead of him with the grandchildren," says his wife, Lyn. "He was almost passing out, breathing hard going up the steps at the Buried Village."

A nurse, she sent her previously fit and healthy husband to the doctor the next day. He was diagnosed with mesothelioma, a terminal cancer of the lung lining caused by asbestos exposure, usually decades earlier.

As if the pain and grief were not enough to cope with, he has become embroiled in a battle for lump-sum compensation from the Accident Compensation Corporation.

ACC accepts that 67-year-old Mr Soeters' "level of permanent impairment is 100 per cent" and this month said it would give him $101,436. It had originally refused him a lump sum because his asbestos exposure would have occurred before April 1, 2002, when the Government re-introduced this form of compensation.

ACC has backed down in his and 25 similar cases after a district court judge's ruling on the late Ross Lehmann's claim. But it has warned it might ask for the money back if its High Court appeal yesterday succeeds.

"It's farcical, callous, the cavalier way they treat us," said Mr Soeters, who came to New Zealand from the Netherlands in 1956 and now lives across the road from Lake Rotorua, near Ngongotaha.

"My childhood and youth were ruined by the Nazis. Now my retirement is taken by asbestos."

Some men afflicted with mesothelioma - the life span from diagnosis is rarely more than a year - have told of inhaling clouds of asbestos dust, some at sites where asbestos-cement boards were cut for use in buildings; not Mr Soeters.

A consulting engineer who designed heating and air-conditioning systems for 40 years, he visited building sites to supervise the construction of his projects. Asbestos was commonly used as insulation on pipes and boiler flues, but he does not recall ever coming into physical contact with it.

"I must have walked into a site at the wrong time from the wrong side."

His cancer symptoms came on in March last year, at first convincing him he had a hard-to-shake cold or flu. During repeated hospital visits he had litres of fluid drained from around his lungs. A procedure to control the fluid build-up has helped, but has also added to his pain. Chemotherapy is causing nausea and vomiting, but he credits it with shrinking the tumours.

"It's a terminal industrial disease with a very short life expectancy. That condition is totally ignored by the powers that be ... In Australia it's worth a minimum of $250,000.

"The $100,000 is no good to me. It's something which gives Lyn a bit more security."

Asbestos claims

* ACC believes it has to pay lump sum compensation only for workplace asbestos exposure or injuries after April 1, 2002, and not historic exposure now being diagnosed.

* That will be decided by a High Court appeal judge.

* Researchers believe historic exposure will kill 12,000 New Zealanders with asbestos cancers.

* Almost 17,000 people are on the Government's voluntary register for people possibly exposed to asbestos.

* Raw asbestos imports ceased in 1991 and the Government is now investigating banning all imports of products containing asbestos, such as some vehicle clutch linings.