Merchant Shipping (Safety Standards for Passenger Ships on Domestic Voyages) (Miscellaneous Amendments) Regulations 2022

Debate between Lord Hodgson of Astley Abbotts and Baroness Randerson

Wednesday 2nd November 2022 Lords Chamber

[Lord Hodgson of Astley Abbotts (Con)]

My Lords, I will not detain the House for more than a moment. I pick up a thread raised by the noble Lord, Lord Berkeley, about the time that this has taken since the “Marchioness” disaster. The Minister will be aware that the Secondary Legislation Scrutiny Committee that I chair has been concerned about the backlog of regulations that await promulgation by her department. The then Minister, Robert Courts, came to talk to us and gave a very impressive report on how action would be taken to close this gap, bring forward the regulations and make sure that we are up to date in all respects.

I am not asking my noble friend to give an answer now; that would be unfair. However, it would be helpful if she could go back to her department and let noble Lords who have participated in this debate know what progress has been made in bringing the department up to date. It has been a—if I may use the police phrase—“serial offender” in this regard. I am not asking her to tell us now, because it is not part of the issue tonight, but it would be helpful for us to know what progress is being made.

[Baroness Randerson (LD)]

My Lords, I thank the noble Lord, Lord Berkeley, for drawing our attention and concern to the situation behind these regulations. I thank the Minister for her introduction and for an excellent impact assessment, which I know her department will have been working on for a long time. I also draw attention to the report of the Secondary Legislation Scrutiny Committee, which expressed our deep concern very effectively and succinctly.

As the noble Lord, Lord Berkeley, made clear, this all relates to—perhaps we should say “was sparked by”—events 33 years ago: the “Marchioness” disaster in 1989. There were 130 people on board, of whom 51 died. It is a source of national disgrace that it has taken this long to get to this point. I lay no blame at the Minister’s door. We are at last getting to the end of this horrendous saga, but the fact that there was no inquiry in 2000, and that it has taken 22 years since then to get to this final stage, should be a source of concern to all of us. This relates to very old ships that predate 26 May 1965—which, if I can be personal for a moment, was my 17th birthday. That gives your Lordships a perspective on how old the ships are that are affected by these regulations.

The interesting thing that is revealed by the Secondary Legislation Scrutiny Committee’s report is that there are still large numbers of these ships being used. Some 600 vessels will be required to make changes to their fire protection equipment, 285 will need to comply with life raft requirements, and 86 will need to comply with life jacket requirements. Those numbers are significant. As a nation, we have a fascination for old vessels. I live in south Wales and we are endlessly interested in the paddle steamer trips between south Wales and north Devon. I see the noble Lord, Lord Davies, nodding because he is well aware of that.

We are all familiar with the details of the tragedy of the “Titanic”. I realise that it would not have been affected because it was not in inland waters. However, the point I am making is that what horrifies us about that disaster are the details—and one detail that everyone picks up on is that there were not enough life rafts for the number of people on that ship. If the people who enjoy trips on historic vessels nowadays realised that they do not need to have life jackets for everyone on board, I am sure that they would be horrified, and probably it would reduce the number of customers they have. So I say to the Minister, “Be strong in the face of opposition to this”. To those people who think that they cannot afford to do it, I say, “You can’t afford not to”. They must provide modern and effective means of saving lives.

Of course we all support this, but I will finish very briefly by echoing the concerns of the noble Lord, Lord Berkeley. I am worried that even more time will elapse before this has to be introduced. We have had 33 years to think about this. The idea that it will take even longer to be done worries me considerably. I urge the Minister to ensure that there is no question of the Secretary of State’s discretion being brought into play to delay it even further. I cannot envisage why anyone owning a ship such as this and using it should not be prepared to make what seem to be fairly limited adjustments and modifications to bring it up to modern safety standards. So I support this entirely.