FORMER shipyard workers from the region will have to wait until the New Year before they find out if they can still claim compensation for an asbestos-related lung disease.

A judgement on whether compensation payments to people who develop "pleural plaques" on their lungs should be phased out is expected soon, after a seven-day trial ended yesterday.

The High Court in Manchester heard ten test cases brought by the insurance industry, including several North-East shipyard workers.

Even though payments have been made to victims for about 20 years, the insurance industry is now saying that the condition does not necessarily lead to other forms of asbestos-related disease.

Plaques on the lungs indicate the patient has been exposed to significant asbestos levels and is at increased risk of developing the fatal lung disease mesothelioma.

Ian McFall, of Thompsons Solicitors in Newcastle, said: "If the insurance companies succeed, people with pleural plaques will not be compensated. That would be unjust as it would mean thousands of people who develop this condition in the future will be denied compensation."

Former ship painter Bill Burnett, 65, from Killingworth, Newcastle, who has received £4,600 for pleural plaques, said: "It will be terrible for people like me if they are left knowing they may end up with a crippling disease, but with no way of receiving any justice."

But a spokesman for the Department of Trade and Industry, which represents British Shipbuilders, said pleural plaques "do not make the worker ill and there is no link between this and further asbestos-related illnesses".