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Chinese Laborers Awarded Millions of Yuan in Class Action Suit
More than 200 Chinese migrant workers have won a rare class action lawsuit against their former employers, who were ordered by a court to pay 208 million yuan (24 million U.S. dollars) in damages to workers who contracted a deadly lung disease while digging a tunnel for a major expressway.
Yu Wei, chief judge of the Wenzhou Intermediate People's Court in east China's Zhejiang Province, also ruled that other farmers who did not join the lawsuit but were diagnosed with silicosis while working for the same employers are also eligible for compensation.
Additional plaintiffs must file suit within one year of their diagnosis, according to the court.
Zhang Fengqiao, one of the plaintiffs in Taishun County, Zhejiang, said he was "grateful" for the care and support given to the victims by local government, court and lawyers.
"We might have lost the case without their support," he said.
Legal analysts said the poor, illiterate workers were farmers from impoverished rural areas who could not have won the case without the legal aid and support of the local government over the past six months.
The court ruled Taishun County Tunnel Engineering Co. and three of its shareholders were responsible for allowing employees to build a tunnel in conditions that caused a heavy concentration of silicon dioxide, which can cause silicosis when inhaled. The tunnel was for an expressway linking Shenyang and Benxi in Liaoning Province, northwest China.
The company and three shareholders were ordered to offer a total of 208 million yuan to the 230 migrant workers, with amounts depending on the degree of injury each sustained.
The court said that from 1993 to 1996, the employers ordered the workers to dig holes with pneumatic drills into rock that had a silicon dioxide density of 97.6 percent.
The employees were not provided with face masks as required by law, according to the verdict.
The workers were also found to have breathed large amounts of dust containing high-density silicon dioxide while digging the tunnel using a dry-operating method, resulting in a work environment filled with thick, polluted dust.
Inhalation of silicon dioxide can cause respiratory problems such as tuberculosis and is often fatal.
Silicosis was first discovered among China's migrant workers in 1998.
A medical check-up conducted by Zhejiang Provincial Occupational Disease Appraisal Committee in September 2000 found that 196 out of about 400 men working in the tunnel had caught the disease, showing various degrees of lung damage. Ten have since died.
Starting last April, a total of 230 migrants filed separate suits against their former employers in the Wenzhou Intermediate People's Court. To best protect the rights of the victims, the Zhejiang provincial government coordinated the filing of a class action suit.
Law enforcement, labor, health, and civil affairs departments in Wenzhou also worked to assist the migrants. The Wenzhou Municipal Court and Taishun County Court spent one million yuan (120,000 U.S. dollars) on investigation of the case.
Many private companies and foreign-funded enterprises in China ignore Chinese laws on work safety and health protection, resulting in health risks and even loss of life for employees.
China has taken a number of measures to protect workers' legitimate rights and interests, such as improving law enforcement for employer negligence and helping employees in foreign-funded companies set up trade unions.
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