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Workmen’s compensation for occupational diseases is governed in Belgium by a 1927 law which excludes respiratory pathologies in miners from its scope of application because of insufficient scientific knowledge. If according to a 1930 law, ill miners could benefit from early retirement due to disability, the compensation system for silicosis that was in effect until 1964 was drafted outside of Parliament and was initiated by those directly concerned, particularly by employers in the coal industry. Surrounded by medical experts, these employers maintained control of two (radiological and clinical) successive surveys, interpreted to conclude that ill miners do not suffer from compensable occupational disease. After 1936, in the new political context, employers raised trade union calls to refinance the old pension system for miners to maintain the 1930 scheme, in which miners had to have been exposed to the risk for a considerable time before they could claim compensation for silicosis.