User:Ravenseft/Sandbox

Merchant Shipping Act 1988

United Kingdom Parliament
Long title	An Act to amend the law relating to the registration of ships; to make provision for the giving of financial assistance in connection with the training of seamen and crew relief costs; to make provision for the establishment of a Merchant Navy Reserve; to make further provision with respect to the safety of shipping, with respect to liability and compensation for oil pollution and with respect to the financing and administration of the lighthouse service; to make other amendments of the law relating to shipping, seamen and pollution; and for connected purposes.
Citation	1988 c. 12
Introduced by	Home Secretary John Reid, July 20 2006
Territorial extent	England and Wales; Scotland; Northern Ireland
Dates
Royal assent	3 May 1988
Commencement	4 July 1988
Repealed	21 March 1994
Other legislation
Repealed by	Merchant Shipping (Registration, etc) Act 1993
Relates to	Merchant Shipping (Registration of Fishing Vessels) Regulations 1988 (S.I. 1988/1926)
Status: Repealed
Text of the Ravenseft/Sandbox as in force today (including any amendments) within the United Kingdom, from legislation.gov.uk.

The Merchant Shipping Act 1988 is an Act of the Parliament of the United Kingdom which introduced several important modifications to the law relating to the regulation of shipping, notably ship registration and safety.

Historical context

The adoption of the Common Fisheries Policy in 1970 provided for a common organisation and structure for the fishing industry and fishing products in the European Economic Community (EEC). Underpinning the new regime was the principle that EEC Member States would ensure "equal conditions of access to and use of [their] fishing grounds". The extent of these fishing grounds was extended in 1977 to a distance of 200 miles from Member States' coastlines. In 1983, faced with a possible threat of overfishing as a result of the opened-up markets, fishing quotas were introduced allocating to individual Member States a 'Total allowable catch' figure. The quota was calculated by reference to the catches made by fishing vessels flying the flag of the Member State in question or registered in that State.

In 1980 the EEC signed an agreement with Spain which allowed Spanish fishing vessels the right to fish in waters of Member States subject to strict limits on fishing by Spanish-registered vessels. However, the Spanish fishermen were able to bypass this restriction in the United Kingdom where the Merchant Shipping Act 1894 allowed for the possibility for non-UK nationals to register their foreign fishing vessels in the UK where they had formed a UK-based company whose name would appear on the register. This mechanism allowed a number of Spanish nationals to re-register their vessels which had previously flown a Spanish flag, as UK vessels under the 1894 Act. Amongst those who profited from this possibility were the claimants in the Factortame litigation who re-registered 53 Spanish vessels and purchased a further 41 UK vessels whose catches all counted against the UK's fishing quota, even though the catches were landed in Spain. This practice is known as "quota hopping".

The UK government sought to put an end to the practice by introducing the British Fishing Boats Act 1983 and the British Fishing Boats Order 1983 which stipulated that all UK-based fishing vessels should have a crew, at least 75% of whom were EEC nationals. These measures were difficult to police and, in any event, they only applied within UK fishing limits, whereas the majority of the Spanish fishing was outside this area. The government then attempted to use the Sea Fish (Conservation) Act 1967 to impose additional conditions on the licences required by UK fishing vessels. These conditions stipulated that the crew should make UK national insurance contributions and should either sell a percentage of their catch in the UK or make a minimum number of visits to the UK during the year. In addition, the 75% crewing condition was modified to exclude nationals of Spain, Greece and Portugal, and an extra requirement was imposed, namely that the crew had to be ordinarily resident in the UK. The European Court of Justice rejected claims that this legislation was incompatible with Community law.

Notwithstanding these measures, the UK government felt there was still a real need to further protect the UK fishing industry and therefore enacted the Merchant Shipping Act 1988.

Main provisions

British fishing register

Part II of the Merchant Shipping Act 1988 put in place a new system of registration of British fishing vessels which operated separately from the UK shipping register.

Vessels previously registered under the old Act would lose their registrations as from 31 March 1989 and would be required to re-register in the new "UK Shipping Register", subject to fulfilling the eligibility conditions.

= Conditions of registration

The new system permitted vessels to be registered as a "British fishing vessel", and therefore to have the right to fish against the UK fishing quota, only where they had "a genuine and substantial connection with the United Kingdom". For this to be the case, three conditions must be met:

1. Not less than 75% of the vessel must be owned by "qualified persons" or "qualified companies";
2. The vessel must bee effectively operated from the UK; and
3. Any charterer, manager or operator had to be a qualified person or company.

A "qualified person" was a British citizen resident and domiciled in the UK. A "qualified company" was a company incorporated in the UK, having its principal place of business there and having at least 75% of its shares owned by, and at 75% of its directors being, qualified persons.

One consequence of this modification was that the definition of what constitutes a "British ship" was no longer linked to the nationality of its owners, but rather to its registration in the new register.

UK shipping register

Separate to the Fishing Register was the UK Shipping Register covering all ships operating from the UK. It replaced the regime put in place by the 1894 Act which had made it compulsory to register a ship in order to have it recognised as a "British ship". Registration had been open to British subjects, as well as those in a "British possession" and companies established in "Her Majesty's dominions".

The 1988 Act removed the requirement to register a ship and also redefined the registration conditions to reflect the fact that

Unlike the old regime, it was no longer compulsory to register a ship - .

, replacing that created by the 1894 Act. Unlike the old register, not all British-owned ships were obliged to register, [...]

Current Status

Much of the Act has now been repealed and updated as a consequence of a broad range of later acts, further information can be found by searching for the act at the HMSO website.

References

• Text of the Transport Act 1962 as in force today (including any amendments) within the United Kingdom, from legislation.gov.uk.

Note

There are entirely unrelated acts of the same name in both Ireland (1962 Transport Act Ireland) and New Zealand (1962 Transport Act New Zealand known as the "Transport Act 1962".