Marine Navigation (No. 2) Bill

Lord Berkeley Excerpts

Friday 18th January 2013 Lords Chamber

[Lord Berkeley]

My Lords, it gives me great pleasure to participate in this debate. I first declare my interest as president of the United Kingdom Maritime Pilots’ Association; I am also a harbour commissioner in the port of Fowey in Cornwall. This seems to be something of a Cornish Bill because the noble Baroness, Lady Wilcox, comes from Cornwall—as does Sheryll Murray MP, who introduced this Bill into the Commons. It is rather nice to think that this Bill, which I am sure will pass, will be a Cornish-originated Bill. Perhaps the rest of the country has something to learn from this; anyway it is good.

As has been said, the draft Bill was published by the previous Government and I made one or two attempts to take it forward in various marine navigation Bills, so of course I generally welcome this Bill. However, when I did my Bill I was required to seek the consent of the Prince of Wales, so I consulted the clerks here as to whether that was needed for this Bill and if not, why not. Helpfully, the counsel to the Cabinet Office has published two versions of a 50-page manual on when, how and whether you need the consent of the Queen or the Prince of Wales to any Bill.

I think some of it is redacted but the key thing is that this Bill does not apparently need the consent of the Prince of Wales—even though he is the harbourmaster of St Mary’s in the Isles of Scilly—because, as the clerk said,

“there is no requirement in the Bill that any harbour authority exercises”,

the duties put on it in this Bill. The clerk then said that,

“the text at line 34 on page 3”,

of this document,

“says a ‘harbour authority may give directions’”.

If the harbour authority was required to give directions, the Prince would have to give his consent but as the word is only “may”, he does not. That is all right then; we can carry on with the Bill. I hope that I have all the quotes right, as it is quite a complicated document.

Looking at the principle of this Bill and of other government legislation in the maritime sector, it has generally been based over the years on light regulation and on the assumption that all parties behave in a sensible and professional manner. The noble Lord, Lord Selsdon, emphasised how important it was to carry on with this so as to encourage as many people to use the water as possible, without getting in the way of others. The problem here is that the pressures on ship owners and crews to save money are nowadays immense: hence tiredness, cutting corners and, often, language problems. Most of the time, it is all right and nothing happens. There are sometimes small incidents and occasionally, sadly, some things one might term disasters, be they oil spills, cruise liners hitting rocks or whatever. We can all say that it will never happen again but, sadly, it occasionally does. In considering this Bill, we should make it proof against one or more parties acting stupidly, dangerously or whatever because the consequences could be catastrophic. I hope that they do not happen very often.

I take as support in this a quote from the Allianz Global Corporate & Specialty insurance company. Earlier this month, in releasing its annual report on ship losses, it said,

“it reveals the main reason for incidents seem to be human error”.

It emphasises that,

“self regulation initiatives and technological improvements such as the introduction of … ECDIS in July”,

all help,

“to reduce accidents, but only if coupled with effective training and management oversight”.

That is an important issue, which I want to speak about when it comes to the pilotage exemption certificates in Clause 2.

There has been much previous debate about Clause 2 over the years in the Commons: about whether it should be there at all and, if so, whether the amendments in this Bill, which add “deck officer” to,

“the master or first mate”,

should be there. The Government say that this is a deregulation benefit but it is really not very clear to whom the benefit applies and by how much. When the noble Baroness winds up, perhaps she can help to quantify this because from the mass of evidence that I have received—the noble Lord, Lord Chidgey, referred to having received a lot of this too—I know that the current PEC requirements under the 1987 Act have been developed and are of long standing over centuries.

I was very interested to hear of the pilotage arrangements for Watchet because I was there a couple of years ago and, with that rise and fall, it is some harbour. There is an old pilot boat in the museum there, which I think has been recreated. It shows how dangerous it was and what the importance of local knowledge was there.

I am not sure where the pressure for this change is coming from. The Chamber of Shipping seems to have confirmed my view that it is coming from a very small sector of the shipping industry; basically, a dredging company in the Thames. There, you have three people on the dredger: the master, the first mate and a third person, who is perhaps the deck officer. Because of the working time directive requirements, the master likes to dump the aggregate on the quay while the first mate likes to do the dredging, so somebody has to drive the ship in between and it obviously has to be the deck officer. We can debate whether such a person has the right training or experience. We will need to debate further whether it is appropriate for such a definition to be applied to bigger shipping. I have seen no substantive argument from the Chamber of Shipping or others to support the claims that this change needs to take place.

There are two key issues here. One is that if the phrase “deck officer” is to be applied properly, it has to have a proper definition of how they are trained and what qualifications they have. I suggest there is also an issue as to what managerial responsibility they have in relation to the master. It is fine to say that he might be the navigation officer. However, if he is also employed and the boss, two levels up, is the master it might be a brave person who overruled that master. While it is not overruling, because the master is in charge, it is a different relationship from just providing the navigation information. There is a lot more work to be done on this, and I hope that we can discuss this more with the noble Baroness between now and Committee.

I shall quote one or two comments about this. The first is from David Phillips, chief harbourmaster of the PLA, who says that,

“pilotage is possibly the most important risk control measure that ports have … It is important to understand that the act of pilotage is a command function. To exercise command at sea requires a measure of experience that will come from sea experience”.

The UK Harbour Masters’ Association wrote to Sheryll Murray on 26 November, saying,

“It is essential that the role of pilot is, in the interests of marine safety, restricted to only the most experienced navigation officers signed on the vessel’s articles or other official document of engagement”.

I met my noble friend Lord West outside. He apologised that he could not be in this debate but allowed me to quote him as saying that he thought that this change in the definition of who could have a PEC was actually dangerous.

The noble Lord, Lord Chidgey, quoted from the House of Commons evidence. Its Transport Select Committee report of 2008 into the Draft Marine Navigation Bill said:

“We are extremely concerned at the proposal in Clause 4 to amend the provision for pilotage to extend the scope of who can hold a PEC. The proposed change would impose additional burdens on competent harbour authorities and make it harder to ensure that only appropriately qualified staff carried out pilotage. This could create unnecessary dangers”.

The only safe way is to remove Clause 2, but I look forward to discussing this with the noble Baroness between now and Committee. I hope that we can reach agreement before then without causing too much delay to the Bill, because I want it to go through.

I turn to Clause 5 and the power of general direction. It is an important part of a CHA’s role, and the current process is very long-winded. This is an important clause, giving harbours the powers to do this more quickly. I have been involved in debates with the ports and the shipping and leisure industries. Most of the time they have to work together, but I suggest that the Bill has to make provision for when they do not. We have all had examples of where this has gone wrong; noble Lords will have seen an interesting video clip 18 months ago of a racing yacht in the Solent going across the bows of a tanker, with the spinnaker getting caught in the racing yacht’s anchor. The mast came down but luckily no one was hurt. What surprised me was that the entire crew were serving naval officers. If the Navy can get it wrong, one or two other people can probably get it wrong as well.

I am not having a bash at the Navy, because there are equal stories on the other side. I heard yesterday from the Royal Yachting Association that, after the ports had said, “We’ll work together. It’ll all be all right. We’ll be very friendly. We’ll consult. The leisure industry needn’t worry. It’ll be all right on the night”, the port of Dundee, which already has the powers, is requiring users of recreational craft, presumably including dinghies, to submit passage plans to the Forth and Tay Navigation Service in advance of putting their boats in the water or going to sea. That goes beyond what is necessary, desirable or even appropriate. If that kind of thing can happen without consultation and listening to those whom they have consulted, it confirms that there is a need for something better than what is currently in the Bill.

I generally support Clause 9, regarding the general lighthouse authorities. It is good for the GLAs to be able to invest and go into commercial business, but I hope that it will bring benefits to the shipping lines and those who pay the light dues. Hopefully, it will improve the efficiency of the whole thing.

With those few words, I wish the Bill well. I hope that we can get it to Royal Assent without too many delays.