Teachers’ union Fenprof is standing firm over the government’s refusal to hand over the full list of the nation’s schools blighted by asbestos.
It is petitioning the courts to see whether the delay breaks Law 2/2011 issued over three years ago to establish procedures for the removal of asbestos from public buildings.
The law clearly states that the government should “draw up a list of all state buildings, installations and equipment that contain asbestos in their construction”.
If the court agrees with Fenprof, the union’s next step will be to file a judicial complaint in parliament, accusing the government of breaking their own law.
The latest twist in the long-running asbestos row comes after education minister Nuno Crato failed to respond in the way the teachers union had hoped to a 10-day deadline set by Lisbon’s administrative and fiscal court.
Fenprof was expecting a full list of the schools under threat, but Crato side-stepped the issue, saying all it could expect was “an official reply confirming that the list was being elaborated” – as the survey was taking time.
The union accuses Crato and his ministry of trying to hide the truth of the nation’s schools’ asbestos risk “in order not to provoke panic among populations”.
Panic, nonetheless, has been provoked – with schools, parents and pupils voicing concerns up and down the country.
“If the court accepts our views, we will advance with a judicial action against the education ministry for their non-compliance with the law over a question of public health,” a Fenprof spokesman told Correio da Manhã on Monday.
The whole asbestos row came to a head earlier this year when CM revealed a quarter of the workforce in a Lisbon state building had come down with cancer. Experts called in to discuss the threat claim deaths will start to accelerate now, as health issues provoked by exposure to asbestos can take 20 to 40 years to come to the surface.
Asbestos has been banned in Europe since 2005, but Portugal is one of a number of countries with acres of asbestos roof panels still in place on government and other buildings.
