Who could possibly take advantage of sick and dying miners? Allegedly, some of the people they would have trusted most: some union officials and lawyers. The Times reported on Tuesday that a subsidiary of the Union of Democratic Mineworkers (UDM) has been collecting notional union subscriptions from ex-miners out of compensation paid by the Department of Trade and Industry (DTI). Now, one firm of solicitors has announced that it is preparing litigation to recover what it believes may amount to millions of pounds on their behalf. So lawyers are finally bringing attention to something to which the DTI may have turned a blind eye.

These events are astonishing both because of their magnitude — 312,000 miners have received compensation so far and there are even more cases pending — and because the Department of Trade and Industry (DTI) seems to have lost control of liabilities that are expected to total £7.5 billion, more than its entire budget for this year. The figures are astronomic. That £7.5 billion is roughly equivalent to adding 2p on income tax (£6.7 billion), or to the total aid to Africa from G8 countries in 2003 (£7.7 billion).

What, exactly, has gone wrong? The DTI began to pay compensation in 1999 to miners suffering from chronic lung diseases and a crippling hand condition called white finger. Officials created a system of Byzantine complexity, guaranteeing to pay the costs of 700 different legal firms for every claim settled. They also, inexplicably, signed a separate agreement with the UDM that allowed the union to handle compensation cases in-house.

It is alleged that the UDM and even some solicitors’ firms that have been referred to the Law Society have either deducted money from miners’ compensation or failed to advise them that other firms were acting without charge, the DTI having agreed to pay all the legal costs when a claim was settled. London solicitor Greene Wood & McLean, who hope to bring the new High Court action, believe that many miners were persuaded to sign agreements under which they had to pay fees of up to £350 a time unnecessarily. Small beer to some perhaps, but not to the miners and not in aggregate when 770,000 ex-miners have brought compensation claims.

John Mann MP has expressed concern that a whole army of trade union employees, professionals and middlemen are feeding off suffering miners. Eighteen MPs have signed an early-day motion demanding that the Government suspend its deal with the UDM. But the DTI says that it has a legal obligation to continue to process claims and settle costs where appropriate — whatever the outcome of the police investigation.

This may come as a relief to more than 400,000 people whose cases still await resolution. Ailing miners and their families do not have the luxury of time. The DTI’s cumbersome process has already delayed decisions. The police must do their work, but the remaining claims must also be processed. This situation cries out for justice, served as swiftly as possible.