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

Lord Tunnicliffe Excerpts

Wednesday 2nd November 2022 Lords Chamber

[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.

[Lord Tunnicliffe (Lab)]

My Lords, I thank the Minister for presenting this SI, my noble friend Lord Berkeley for his amendment, and all Peers who have taken part in this discussion.

This instrument, to apply safety requirements to certain passenger vessels built before 1965, has my full support, but my noble friend is right to ask why it has not been brought forward until now. These are important requirements relating to fire safety, bilge alarms, lifeboats, lights and life jackets, which have been called for over recent decades. I hope that the Minister will explain why they have not been introduced sooner. Until now, the regulations have applied only to vessels built since 2010, which has left over 600 vessels not meeting the standard.

I hope that the Minister can account for the delay and confirm whether the department has received reports of any safety incidents which may have otherwise been prevented had this instrument been brought forward sooner. Can the Minister also confirm whether any further vessels are in any way exempt? Finally, what steps will the department take to monitor compliance with these regulations?

[Baroness Vere of Norbiton (Con)]

I am grateful to all noble Lords for this short debate and am relieved and delighted that all noble Lords agree that these regulations are necessary. All noble Lords—including the Minister—agree that they have potentially taken too long. That should concern all noble Lords and I will start by addressing the timeline.

I mentioned in opening that there has been an inordinate amount of engagement on this, because the types of vessels and ships that we are covering in these regulations are hugely diverse. They operate in very different categories of water. The Government received an enormous amount of pressure and representation from Members of your Lordships’ house, from Members of Parliament and from local elected officials—and, of course, they are all absolutely right to bring these matters to our attention. However, it caused some delay in reaching the right balance, which I believe we have got to today.

We had two public consultations, which was good, and five workshops between 2016 and 2019. Since then, we have focused on some of the more challenging vessels, where safety was not necessarily 100% proven and there was a case to be made, which is why we ended up taking so long on these regulations. However, we are where we are, and we have to play on the pitch we are on. We are now putting them in front of your Lordships’ House, and I hope they will be passed today.