BusinessLive reports that gold miners in SA with silicosis or tuberculosis, or their dependents, will secure payments of between R70,000 and R500,000 from a trust fund set up by seven mining companies and lawyers for ill workers to settle the country’s largest class-action law suit.  

The mining companies have provided for R5bn towards the settlement agreement that was signed in Johannesburg on Thursday.  The settlement has to be ratified by the court and is unlikely to be implemented before the third quarter of this year.  The agreement sets out 10 classes of claimants who can benefit from the settlement, which is over and above the statutory payments from a government-administered fund that disburses money for those afflicted by occupational diseases.  "There is no limit on the number of potential claimants.  Any claimant who has a qualifying claim will receive the compensation due to them during the lifetime of the trust," the parties to the agreement said in a statement.  The companies will put in R1.4bn for the first two years of benefit payments and thereafter be called on by the trust to make annual contributions based on the claims laid against the companies by ill mineworkers or their dependents.

• Read this report by Allan Seccombe in full at BusinessLive
• Read too, South African gold miners agree to landmark silicosis, TB settlement, at Mining Weekly
• Read a comprehensive statement by the claimants’ lawyers at Politicsweb

Get other news reports at the SA Labour News home page