First, I congratulate my noble friend Lord Rooker on his usual diligence and research, looking into the details of why the Government want to remove this measure. Indeed, he is right: a lot has come from the inquiries, and I will refer to some of them. I support the deletion of this clause, which would repeal the Merchant Shipping Act 1995. Perhaps I should declare an interest, as I was a seaman for 10 years, a union official, and spent 40 years as a Member of Parliament, 10 of which as a Minister of Transport. I had to order some of these inquiries, and have experience of them, which I will bring to the Committee’s attention.
We are dealing here with the Secretary of State’s power to order a re-hearing of a formal investigation if there is new and important evidence. It is to that judgment that I now address some of my remarks: about how, given that discretion, you may make the wrong decision, and whether it weakens inquiries to simply remove the present duty to order a re-hearing, as the clause would do.
As the former Secretary of State with responsibility for these inquiries and requests for re-hearing, I think that we are all agreed that making judgments about these matters is a duty upon the Secretary of State. The clause would make it discretionary. That is what causes me concern.
I see in the nature of any re-hearing and use of discretionary powers, one is to take into account how long it is since the original inquiry before one is requested to have a re-hearing. The argument is often that it has been too long since the accident, people’s memories are not clear and it is not wise to hold an inquiry under those circumstances. Making a judgment
as to the practical value of a re-hearing and what we would gain from it if, indeed, we have one are for the Minister to take account of in his considerations. But, at the end of the day, I should have thought it important, if there is to be a re-hearing, to have some idea of what one wants to find out. Can it be done by discretion? That is why we have inquiries. That is where the judgment comes in—to find out what the facts are. I suggest to noble Lords, and I hope that I will be able to prove, that the only thing a Minister can do at his discretion is to take the advice of his department, which is not always impartial in some circumstances, as I can show. A Minister is therefore highly influenced by the advice he receives from the department.
I should therefore like to present to the Minister and the Committee a couple of experiences that came out of three inquiries. I do not have to go into the detail. Some will already know them, and my noble friend has already mentioned one—the “Derbyshire”, which was a bulk carrier. Another vessel, a fishing trawler, was the “Gaul”, and the third, which most will know about, was the terrible tragedy of the “Marchioness”. When I came into government in 1997, I had to order a re-inquiry into the circumstances of those three incidents.
A long period of time was involved in all those because, after the vessels sank, no vessel was in evidence. It was not known where they were and they were only found later. The “Gaul” went down in 1974 but she was not found until some 18 years later by a TV company that went looking for her. The “Derbyshire” was another case of a vessel that went down and was found many years later, after money was provided from the trade unions and the European Community—to which my noble friend referred. They were pressing hard to get an inquiry as to where the ship was. She sank off Japan, with a loss of 44 lives, most of them from Liverpool, and people wanted to know why. I shall come to the “Marchioness” which was a particular case.
However, in the case of the “Gaul”, which went missing in 1974, she was found in, I think, 1997, with a loss of 36 lives. There had been an inquiry. Inevitably, if the vessel could not be found, one could probably say, to the best of one’s knowledge, “The vessel is not here but she went down in bad weather”. That seemed to be a reasonable conclusion. If there was no further information and no vessel, one had to arrive at that conclusion—and that is what it was. I have to tell noble Lords, as regards the “Gaul”, one has to take account of the relatives. Not much is said in here about the concerns of the relatives. They certainly want to be satisfied that everything has been done about it.
The “Gaul” case is peculiar because British trawlers were used as spy ships in the North Sea, and the Government admitted that to me in Answers to Parliamentary Questions at the time, in the 1970s. The relatives thought that the ship had gone down because she had been torpedoed on a spying mission. It sounds outrageous but that is what they believed. To satisfy that great concern, and knowing that such vessels had been used for spying off the coast of Russia, I ordered the inquiry—more to see if we could get the truth. I
could only do that once the ship had been found, as happened many years later. When we investigated, there was no damage from any kind of military action; it was obvious that the ship had been overwhelmed. Anyone who knows about the fishing industry knows that the fish is wound in up the back and side, and if the sea is going the wrong way it fills that type of vessel which goes down very quickly. All the evidence showed that there was insufficient security covering the ship. She had taken a hit by a large wave and gone down. The circumstances of the loss due to the weather were confirmed, as the original inquiry had said in the absence of the ship. But we were trying to satisfy the relatives who wanted to know what happened. That is important in these circumstances.
That was the “Gaul”. I mentioned three ships, and the next was the “Derbyshire”, which sank off the coast of Japan in a typhoon. The first inquiry concluded that there was bad weather but went on to say that it suspected bad seamanship. That caused a great deal of concern among seafarers and their families.
Eighteen years later the ship was discovered after the trade unions went looking for it. Indeed, I had to make a request to Tony Blair who rang Clinton to ask whether we could use the very famous searching mechanisms of Woods Hole. That institution originally found the “Titanic” and it found the “Derbyshire”, which was smashed to bits. It managed to bring the ship together, and there was a remarkable exercise by the investigation branch in Britain to look at what had happened to it.
I do not have time to go into the technical issues but the point is that the re-inquiry then discovered the circumstances. It was not bad seamanship which they were led to believe because a rope hold had been left open and not tied down. Then it found that seamanship was not the problem but a piece of equipment on the ship had led to the loss of the vessel. It was controversial at the time because the shipyards were privatised and they had to give a guarantee that if there was negligence on the ship there would have to be compensation, which the Government would have to pay, not the people who bought the yard.
That is the background that Ministers have to consider when looking at inquiries. The “Derbyshire” case led to changes in the structures of vessels. Two or three of these bulk carriers had gone so it was right to hold the inquiry. The decision of the original inquiry had to be changed and, at the same time, we learnt about the safety of bulk carriers. Those of us in the industry saw an awful lot of bulk carriers, largely off Australia, but we always suspected that there was something wrong with the design.
Then there was the “Marchioness” and the loss of 51 lives. That was a terrible tragedy. In that case the Government did not hold one inquiry, never mind a re-inquiry. I constantly took delegations to Mr Parkinson who was then the Secretary of State. The relatives wanted an inquiry. You might ask why there was not a first inquiry. The Minister decided not to have one. He took the view that there was a court case under way on the “Bowbelle” and if it hit the “Marchioness”, that would lead to a problem. I said at the time of the accident in a letter to the Times that there looked to be
negligence on behalf of the department. Why? Those launches had dance decks. When a new deck was put on an old ship the department had to make a decision on stability and safety. In this case the “Bowbelle” came up from behind and the skipper could not see because of all the dancers who were between him on the bridge and the stern.
In the week that the “Marchioness” went down I said that the department had some responsibility for agreeing to the design and the change to the vessel. The Minister had to make a decision about the inquiry. He said that there was nothing to learn from an inquiry. I pointed to a number of inquiries that changed safety procedures in the Thames. If a Minister has discretion in such cases, presumably his department has to be impartial. We discovered that there had been a mistake in the design of the vessel. The legal department told me that we could not have an inquiry because it was too long since the vessel went down. That is the kind of advice you would got from a Minister to another Minister—the memories will not be there. The legal people said to me, “You can’t get the legal power”. I had to go to the Lord Chancellor and get his view and tell my legal department that it was wrong. I ordered that inquiry.
These are the conflicts. A legal department could say, “We might have some responsibility here. We had better not have an inquiry—let’s leave it to the discretion of the Minister”. There were statements from the Minister at the time, and even though there was a duty to carry out an inquiry, he did not do so.
The point of using these ships as examples is that it was left to the discretion of the Minister. There are varying qualities of Minister, including me. One way or another we have to make a judgment. It is not a good idea to give discretion to a Minister who invariably does not come from a background of shipping as I do, which can be measured. Ministers are politicians who come from various backgrounds. He is reliant on experts but should exercise discretion over whether there is anything to be learnt from reopening an inquiry. How do you know that unless you make some inquiries? Do you just make a judgment on something and say, “I have a feeling about this. I’ve read about it in all the papers. They suggest that we should not reopen the inquiry and I won’t”.? You need the facts. How the heck do you get the facts unless they are obtained through investigation and inquiry? Are we actually saying that the Minister can make a decision without knowing the facts? I am not saying that all Ministers necessarily take the advice that is offered. I was given good advice by the department. However, when a decision is left to a Minister’s discretion, he may be overwhelmed by the experts around him whose interest is not to have a further inquiry, as I have shown in the examples I have given.
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I had to come to the House of Commons and apologise to relatives and to everybody because we had found that the department was responsible. The only issue that we are considering here is the discretionary power of a Minister to reopen an inquiry. At the end of the day, why are we doing this? I do not know whether the research undertaken by the noble Lord,
Lord Rooker, shows how many times inquiries have been reopened. There cannot be many of them, so why are we doing it? If this deregulation measure is about cost—not the Red Tape Challenge that the noble Lord, Lord Rooker, was talking about—we are really saying that the department has to make a judgment in these cases and sometimes it has a vested interest. It also knows that any measures recommended by the inquiries mean that the department has to introduce changes. Of course, it has, but you cannot leave this issue solely to discretion rather than a duty to act. Can the Minister tell us how many times inquiries have been reopened? It cannot have been done many times. I did three in one go. I see the Minister indicating that four such inquiries have been reopened, but over how many years? As I say, I did three in one go, but that is because the Government of the day refused to reopen the relevant inquiry.
When I became Deputy Prime Minister in 1997, I told the relatives that we would hold an inquiry. The essential issue is what we learn about events and safety from relatives and seafarers. What we are being asked to do here is to change a rarely invoked requirement that was placed on government in the Merchant Shipping Acts. Now the decision to act is to be left to the Minister’s discretion despite all the different pressures to which he is subject. Can noble Lords really believe that there was no inquiry into the “Marchioness” case until I ordered one, despite all those people dying in that terrible tragedy? Some 50 or so lives were lost. Therefore, I do not believe that this should be a discretionary power but rather a requirement and a duty.
I hope the Committee will say that we should leave the power as it is and not change it as to do so will diminish safety and deny relatives the right to know what happened to their family members—knowledge which could be gained from such an inquiry. The relatives of those who died on the “Marchioness” were upset because the coroner would not allow them to see the bodies. Why would he not allow them to see the bodies? Why did he refuse to co-operate? It was because the hands and feet had been cut off and he did not want the relatives to see the bodies with no hands or feet. That was the practice on the Thames at that time. Relatives are entitled to know the truth and that can best be delivered by an inquiry.
I have been involved in merchant shipping all my life. I remember getting into a fight over the Merchant Shipping Acts—the old Master and Servant Acts—with the then Labour Government in 1966, so I have lived with them all my life. There are now hundreds of cruise liners with some 1,000 people on each. So millions of people are travelling on these cruise liners and the death rates and incidents and number of people going missing from ships is growing at an alarming rate. A campaign is now going on in Liverpool to trace a nursery steward on a Disney ship, Rebecca Coriam, who was reported missing from the ship. There was no inquiry or investigation. The Government were asked why nothing was being done about this British citizen. However, there was no inquest. She was on a ship that came under the jurisdiction of the Bahamas, but the rules there are pretty slack. By the way, the three “Queens” of our big fleet have gone to the Bahamas for tax reasons where, to my mind, there
is very informal safety regulation. The campaign to find Rebecca is being run in Liverpool. I know the Government have refused to do anything about an inquest. Why can we not have an inquest for a British citizen?
In America they have got concerned about it so they produced a piece of legislation in 2010. They are extremely concerned about the increasing number of people going missing and rapes and murders occurring on these ships. Rockefeller has now brought out a Bill that requires every ship under whatever flag to report what happens to any citizen of America to the FBI and the FBI then holds an inquiry. It is required to do it. Over here we look the other way and will not even have an inquest. That is quite wrong. There are thousands of British citizens going on these ships under different flags of different countries with different approaches to the law. If you are talking about regulation—I cannot expect the Minister to answer that; perhaps we could arrange a meeting and talk it through properly.
It is the same Act, by the way, that was used to change some regulation. Here it is—the Government have just passed it. I see they have increased the compensation on ships if you lose your luggage. Should we not be giving more attention to the lives on the ship rather than the ruddy luggage? This is a regulation that has just been passed by this Government. Fine, great—have a look at the inquest procedures and look at what we can do about those. Bill Anderson is leading the campaign, doing a wonderful job, bringing the ropes together. We have no satisfaction on this. We are still on to the Foreign Office and the Government. We need to get an agreement about it.
If British citizens, crew or passengers, go on cruise liners, and they are lost, we should have someone responsible, like the Americans, to report to our authorities and then tell the relatives what happened, to the best of their knowledge. We do not have that at the moment so if we put all these things together, let us look at regulation. You can take it a bit further if you want but what we are choosing to do now by taking this right away is dangerous. It is bad for relatives. It does not tell us anything about the safety. It leaves it to the political judgment—and we are all politicians here. As we found with the “Marchioness”, the advice came from a department that had been guilty of the loss of that vessel, for which I had to apologise, so it was no surprise that it did not want an inquiry. This would make it easier for such departments. I am against the clause and I hope we delete it.