Mother challenges landlord over son's asthma
Debbie Andalo and agencies
Tuesday May 4, 2004
The Guardian
A Scottish mother is taking her landlord to court in a groundbreaking legal action over damp conditions in her home which she claims gave her son asthma, it emerged today.
The case, which is believed to be the first of its kind in the UK, comes the same day that an international report revealed that Scotland has the worst level of asthma in the world.
Parent Linda MacKenzie has obtained legal aid to sue Glasgow city council and Glasgow Housing Association (GHA). Her lawyers will argue that her landlord failed in its statutory duty of care under the Occupiers' Liability Scotland Act 1960.
The court will also consider evidence which links asthma with dust mites which, if proven, experts warn could open the floodgates to similar cases.
Ms MacKenzie, from Glasgow, alleges that her seven-year-old son Richard developed asthma after being exposed to high levels of the faeces of house dust mites, which thrive in warm damp conditions. She is taking the local authority to court as her previous landlord, and the GHA as her current landlord, for £50,000.
Expert witness Dr Stirling Howieson, an architect and engineer at Strathclyde University, tested Ms MacKenzie's flat for a protein in dust mite faeces associated with the risk of asthma.
A sample taken from the mattress surface in the child's bedroom found 1,400mcg of the protein per 1g of house dust - 700 times the safety level set out by the World Health Organisation and the highest levels he had ever seen, he said.
He added: " This case could be just the tip of the iceberg, and if the link between dust mites and asthma is proved in court, it could really open the floodgates in terms of the claims against landlords."
Mike Dailly, principal solicitor with the Govan Law Centre, said they were awaiting further immunological tests on the boy but added: "In the UK, we've been able to establish asthma can be exacerbated by damp living conditions but no one has been able to establish a causal connection between these conditions and asthma, but we've got the technology now to do that.
"We are trying to prove breach of contract by the landlord, that they failed to carry out repairs which could have improved conditions in the house and that they are therefore responsible for the child catching asthma. This is a condition which you have for the rest of your life. It's the same as if you sue an employer because you caught asbestos poisoning at work."
Details of the legal challenge coincided with the report of a study by the Global Initiative for Asthma (Gina) which revealed that 18.4% of Scots are, or have been, asthma sufferers - the highest level in the world. Wales was ranked fourth with 16.8 % of its population showing asthma symptoms at some stage compared to 15.3 % in England. Bottom of the table were Indonesia with 1.1 % and Macau with 0.7%.
SocietyGuardian.co.uk © Guardian Newspapers Limited 2004
Related articles
04.05.2004: Scots top global asthma table
http://society.guardian.co.uk/publichealth/story/0,11098,1209186,00.html