The new chair of the All-Party Coalfield Communities Group has called on the government to investigate whether wide variations in compensation paid to injured miners may be explained at least in part by bad advice from solicitors.

David Anderson, Labour MP for Blaydon, said it is in the ‘public interest’ that the government scrutinises statistics exposing wide variations in average payouts secured by firms handling most claims. The average payout varies by as much as 290% among firms handling most cases for chronic obstructive pulmonary disease and vibration white finger, parliamentary answers show.

Anderson recently met David Kidney, junior minister at the Department of Energy and Climate Change (DECC), to raise the issue. Lord Lofthouse of Pontefract, who has campaigned on behalf of miners for more than two decades, also called for an inquiry.

Kidney has agreed to conduct a preliminary audit. The minister said the department will examine ‘obvious’ trends in departmental records, before he decides whether to instigate a fuller investigation.

The Solicitors Regulation Authority and the Legal Complaints Service said that the matter is outside their remit.

The SRA said it has taken action against solicitors where they breached the solicitors’ code, but not because of their success or otherwise in securing appropriate compensation. An LCS spokesman said miners could seek independent legal advice on negligence if they believed an award was too low.

Zahida Manzoor, legal services ombudsman, said she would ‘expect miners with the same degree of illness to receive equivalent compensation’.