Emily’s Code: Pleasure Vessel Safety

John Hayes Excerpts

Wednesday 1st March 2017 Westminster Hall

[The Minister of State, Department for Transport (Mr John Hayes)]

It is a pleasure to respond to this short debate. I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Gloucester (Richard Graham) for securing it and bringing these matters to the House’s attention.

I have been a Member of Parliament for 20 years, a Front-Bench spokesman for my party for 18 years and a Minister since 2010. Over that time, I have spoken in Parliament hundreds of times, sometimes about significant things, often about insignificant things and usually, I hope, with good humour, but I have rarely spoken on an occasion that combines solemnity and importance as much as this one. This is a sad occasion, but a hopeful one too.

It is important that I emphasise how valuable this debate is. It provides the opportunity for me not only to join my hon. Friend in offering personal condolences, and those of Her Majesty’s Government, to Emily’s family and friends—I note that her parents, Clive and Debbie, her sister Katie, her brother Todd and her grandparents are here today; I welcome them and offer those condolences to them—but to join him in my admiration for their campaign, their effort, their spirit and the difference that they are making.

I do not understand death—I barely understand life, actually—but what I do know is that each life has a purpose. That purpose is not entirely a matter of the span of a life; it is really about the fact that, throughout the time we spend here, each of us touches and affects many other people. Through the development of this work and this code, little Emily, who died in this tragedy, is not only touching the lives of those who were close to her, but the lives of hundreds, thousands, tens of thousands, hundreds of thousands of others. Her impact will be much greater than the span of her short life. It will change all those lives for the better. It is therefore a real pleasure for me not only to welcome, but to endorse Emily’s code. It will be a lasting legacy and memorial to the daughter who was so loved and to the sister and the granddaughter who is so missed by the family, who are here today.

We in politics are in this business because we want to make a difference. That is why we are what we are and why we do what we do. We try to make a difference for good, don’t we, but other people can make as much of a difference—perhaps more of a difference—than most of us do, however long we spend here and however much we succeed. What I am so impressed by is the seriousness and care that has been taken in the development of this code.

It is true, as John Masefield said in his poem, “Sea Fever”, that

“the call of the running tide”

is a feature of our lives and these islands. It has been for all the time that men and women have lived here. We cherish our seagoing heritage and all that it means. It can, as my hon. Friend the Member for Gloucester said, bring immense joy, excitement and thrills, but it also brings risk and danger, and that is precisely why it is important that we establish good practice and underpin it with regulation in the way that he suggested. An important principle at the heart of what he said today and what the code embodies is that learning through education and the establishment of what he described in his short speech as a set of rather simple, rather straightforward principles can make such a difference in guaranteeing the wellbeing of those who are called down to the running tide.

I have a long and detailed speech prepared for me by my excellent officials, but I will not give it, because I do not feel I should give it. Instead, I want to respond to this debate as a father of two young sons. I feel this, like everyone listening to this debate will, in that spirit. I looked at the code, and thought, “This is exactly as good as it could be. It is just perfect, isn’t it?” The code is in line with RNLI practice and has its support. The code is very much in the spirit of our wonderful Maritime and Coastguard Agency, which does such valuable work in providing the assurance of safety that I mentioned a moment or two ago. I met the MCA just today to discuss the code and this debate.

The code is in tune and chimes with the work we do through our regular inspections and through the intelligence provided about ships, the weather, our coast and the dangers that those circumstances can bring. More than that, through its straightforwardness, persuasiveness and its relationship with Emily, it will make an immense difference in changing people’s perceptions of the joy and the risks associated with the sea.

The code is, as I have said, straightforward. It states:

“Wear a suitable lifejacket or buoyancy aid

Service equipment

Get trained

Make a plan

Know your limits

Carry distress signals

Use the kill cord”—

that is a way of turning off the engine in a boat—

“Know your boat

Have a radio

Check the weather”.

Those may sound like rather routine things, but my goodness, if the code is applied with rigour and enthusiasm and people know how much it matters, it will make an immense difference. So many accidents and tragedies are associated with one or more of those straightforward, but timeless principles.

It is a delight to speak in this debate, but it is also a responsibility. It is critical that education, training and voluntary initiatives associated with the leisure sector emerge from the work that has been done by Emily’s family. With the guiding hand of the Royal Yachting Association, the pleasure boats sector has aspired to and achieved very good safety standards, and we need to say that Emily’s loss was an exception. It is not the rule; our seas are safe and they are well policed. All the agencies I have described do sterling work to ensure that that continues to be the case.

Having said all that—I have also been in contact with the RYA, and I know that its training is of the highest standards—it is still important that we know there will be those who, for one reason or another, get involved in boats and do not take for granted those straightforward, resonant messages. There will be those who will not necessarily know the sea as well as they might. There will be those who are therefore at risk. The Government’s commitment is such that not only do I give an assurance that we will do all that is necessary to make the code as widely established and as well-known as it can be, but we will formally launch the code at the Royal Yachting Association’s dinghy show at Alexandra Palace and we are sending a senior coastguard commander to do so. We will continue to promote the national drowning prevention strategy, which aims to halve the 400 or so accidental drownings in all forms of water by 2026. Even where accident levels are thankfully low, we must do more. It is our purpose, but more still, it is our mission.

I started by paying tribute to Emily’s family, and I do so again. The difference they are making is profound and appreciated. As I have said, the code will change many, many lives for the better. Marcel Proust said:

“Happiness is beneficial for the body, but it is grief that develops the powers of the mind.”

That is not an easy lesson to learn. When one is obliged to learn it by circumstance and then turn the power of the mind to a noble purpose, it deserves to be recognised in the way that my hon. Friend has allowed us to do today. I thank him for that and once again offer the thanks of the whole House of Commons and the Government to Emily’s family for the difference they are making.

Question put and agreed to.