However, the UDM decided to levy an additional fee from every non-union member who agreed to pursue a settlement through Vendside, a claims handling company it owns.

This tactic, under which between £50 and £500 plus VAT is deducted from the compensation, has earnt Vendside at least an additional £2 million.

Frank Young, 61, is among thousands of UDM claimants who lost a slice of their compensation. Mr Young, who retired in 1993 after a 23-year career as a miner, developed vibration white finger (VWF) from many years of using drills to bore into rock at the coalface of Harworth Colliery, in north Nottinghamshire.

Mr Young, a member of the UDM until his retirement, signed an agreement with Vendside after receiving a letter from the union which encouraged him to put in a claim. Vendside passed his case to a firm of solicitors and he received several thousand pounds in compensation, £352.50 of which was paid to the union under the contract.

Though he had been a paid-up member throughout his years as a miner, the UDM/Vendside still charges a fee to retired former members who no longer pay the annual union subscription.

Mr Young had not realised — because, he says, no one at Vendside or the UDM had informed him — that had he taken his case directly to a solicitors’ firm he would not have had a single penny deducted.

He knew better by the time his wife Margaret received notification of the settlement of the claim she had made on behalf of her father, who died aged 71 suffering from chronic bronchitis and emphysema.

John Smith Palmer spent 35 years as a miner in Kent and Nottinghamshire. The coal dust severely damaged his lungs and in the years before his death in 1980 he suffered from breathlessness and, according to his daughter, had “zero quality of life”. Mrs Young’s claim, initially registered with the UDM, was passed to a firm of solicitors. After two years she was told that the payment would be £13,689, from which £587.50 would be deducted as Vendside’s fee.

The Youngs, who live in Harworth, decided that they were not willing to pay any money to Vendside, so the union is taking them to court, where they will be represented by their MP, John Mann. He has fought a long campaign to highlight what he sees as the “rank greed and injustice” of UDM policy.

A UDM spokesman said that charging “a nominal sum to non-members who wish to pursue a claim” was to ensure that there was “no disadvantage to subscription-paying members”. “Non-members are under no obligation to instruct Vendside and could approach alternative solicitors,” he said.

THE DISEASES

CHRONIC OBSTRUCTIVE PULMONARY DISEASE (COPD) covers a range of chest complaints, including chronic bronchitis and emphysema, whose main symptom is breathlessness

VIBRATION WHITE FINGER (VWF) is a painful and sometimes crippling hand condition linked to the use of vibrating tools and machinery

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