Memorandum from the Chichester Harbour
Conservancy (DMNB 12)
Thank you for the opportunity to comment on
the Draft Marine Navigation Bill. This letter constitutes an officer
level response by the Chichester Harbour Conservancy to the Joint
Committee of the two Houses of Parliament and is restricted in
its scope to those proposals in which the Conservancy has a locus.
THE CHICHESTER
HARBOUR CONSERVANCY
Under the Chichester Harbour Conservancy Act
1971, the Conservancy is both the statutory harbour authority
for Chichester Harbour and, uniquely, the Joint Advisory Committee
responsible for managing the Chichester Harbour Area of Outstanding
Natural Beauty (AONB). In this latter role it has the additional
powers and duty to manage the harbour and AONB for leisure, recreation
and conservation of nature. It is a Trust Port with a Statutory
Advisory Committee and, with over 10,000 registered vessels, is
the largest leisure harbour in the country.
The principal officer of the Conservancy is
the Manager & Harbour Master and he is responsible to the
Conservancy for discharging the statutory functions for both the
harbour and AONB.
POWERS OF
GENERAL DIRECTION
Given the extreme difficulty/impossibility in
obtaining new byelaws and amending existing ones, such that the
ability of harbour authorities to manage their harbours' safely
is impaired, the granting of powers to issue general directions
to shipping is overdue and most welcome.
However, the Conservancy recognise that the
power to issue general directions is a potent legal tool and proposed
new general directions should the subject of public consultation
and accountability. It supports the requirement for meaningful
consultation and would endorse some form of non-binding arbitration
if there are valid and substantive objections. Non-binding, because
ultimately it is important that harbour authorities should not
be stopped from managing their harbours safely, in accordance
with the Port Marine Safety Code, by vexatious or minor objections.
COMPETENT HARBOUR
AUTHORITIES—REMOVAL
OF PILOTAGE
POWERS
The Conservancy supports the measure permitting
the Secretary of State to remove from competent harbour authorities
the powers and duties relating to pilotage.
In common with a number of competent harbour
authorities, the Conservancy has not required or exercised pilotage
for over 25 years. This has never caused problems or created a
misunderstanding with mariners and there is, therefore, no incentive
or merit in promoting an expensive and time consuming HRO to remove
the pilotage powers. From the Conservancy's perspective this is,
therefore, a welcome measure but is not judged an urgent matter.
NATIONAL OCCUPATIONAL
STANDARDS FOR
HARBOUR MASTERS
The Conservancy supports the requirement for
Harbour Masters to be fit for purpose. This should be achieved
by appointing to a job description and person specification with
the Harbour Authority making judgements on the qualifications
and suitability of applicants to meet the job description. National
Occupational Standards will help the Board make those judgements.
However the Conservancy has concerns over the
way National Occupational Standards and supporting qualifications
may be introduced in the "Qualification Regulations":
— Proportionality of Standards.
No two harbours are the same. They vary widely in size, purpose,
type and number of vessels using the harbour, the number of employees
and range of skills available in the harbour authority. A "one
size fits all" approach to occupational standards would not
therefore be appropriate and could lead to over and under qualified
harbour masters. There may be dangerous gaps in ability, duplication
of effort, expensive and unnecessary training and/or the disqualification
of otherwise suitably qualified applicants.
Standards need therefore to be flexible to match
the function of a particular port or harbour and thus the job
description of the Harbour Master. This would suggest a menu driven
approach that matches a suite of standards to the job description.
— Qualifications. Qualifications
should follow and match the menu driven approach of the occupational
standards required to meet the job description for a particular
port.
There is currently a very wide range of existing
qualifications that may meet the various job description criteria
for a harbour master post. These may be in maritime, port operations,
financial, planning, leisure, personnel and other fields. These
qualifications in combination with appropriate experience and
personal skills may make an individual fit for purpose and should
be accepted as recognised `qualifications' where appropriate.
It follows that any "official list"
of recognised qualifications, needed to meet occupational standards,
should include all appropriate existing qualifications. For instance,
parts of the maritime requirement may, depending on the job description,
be met by: Royal Navy, Merchant Navy, RYA and some foreign certification.
In this context, experience and skills acquired
from previous employment cannot be discounted and the role of
National Vocational Qualifications (NVQ) may need to be examined.
— The Role of the Harbour Authority.
The responsibility for appointing a harbour master rests with
the harbour authority from a list of applicants for the post.
An applicant with the correct certification may not be the best
candidate and, indeed, may have significant character or other
faults. In the absence of an applicant who has all the approved
qualifications, the harbour authority must be free to appoint
the best candidate and if necessary arrange subsequent training
and certification.
In sum, it would not be appropriate and would
be unworkable to have a single prescriptive national occupational
standard for all harbour master posts and to require a unique
qualification to meet that standard.
It is essential that the Bill safeguards against
the inflexible and disproportionate implementation of National
Occupational Standards in the Qualification Regulations.
POWERS OF
GENERAL LIGHTHOUSE
AUTHORITY (GLA) TO
ENFORCE DUTIES
ON LOCAL
LIGHTHOUSE AUTHORITY
(LLA)
The Conservancy supports the principle of this
measure but considers that it needs to give additional powers
to LLAs in order to implement it. A common problem faced by LLAs
is getting third parties (Local Authorities, British Telecom,
electricity companies, private marinas and others) to maintain
aids to navigation that were required when the works were licensed.
Many of the works may be defunct and the agency responsible for
the works may have no interest or incentive to maintain the aid
to navigation marking it and therefore cease to do so.
LLAs do not have the powers to enforce against
third parties and it would be unreasonable to give enforcement
powers to GLAs against LLAs without giving similar powers to LLAs
to enforce against third parties.
June 2008
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