With this object in view, they recommended that the preliminary inquiry now made by the receiver of wrecks should be limited in the first place to such a narrative statement as would enable the Board of Trade, with the aid of their legal advisers, to decide on the propriety of an official inquiry, and that, if such were found necessary, there should be a complete severance between that inquiry and any proceedings of a penal character, power being reserved to the Board of Trade to prosecute the Shipowner or to proceed criminally against the master, mate, or any member of the crew whose neglect of duty may have occasioned the disaster. They further suggest that the 11th Section of the Merchant Shipping Act, 1871, “should be amended and be made expressly to extend to the master of the vessel; for it is very important to avoid any doubt that the master who, without justifiable excuse, leaves port with his vessel in an unseaworthy condition, renders himself amenable to the criminal law.”[263]
The Commissioners very properly attached great importance to these inquiries, as affording the best means of ascertaining on whom the culpability rests; hence, they, incidentally, remark that, in comparing the accidents occurring at sea with those taking place on land, especially on railways, they were struck by the fact that, whereas, in the latter case, it is usual to prosecute those servants whose negligence has occasioned loss of life, there was scarcely a single instance of the prosecution of a master or mate, or of a man on the look-out or at the helm of a vessel, although cases have, undoubtedly, been numerous in which vessels have been lost either by the negligence of the master or of the crew.
They further recommend that the present system under which the certificate of a master or other officer is suspended, very frequently only for an error of judgment, should be entirely discontinued, and that neither the Court of Inquiry nor the Board of Trade should have the power of dealing with such certificates; but that, in cases to be provided for by express enactment, the tribunal alone before which the officer is tried should have the power of cancelling either all his certificates, or, at its discretion, his higher certificates, leaving him in these cases the chance of finding employment in a lower grade.[264]
Examination of masters and mates, shipping offices, &c., &c., approved.
The examination of masters and mates, the regulation of space for crews, the insertion of the scale of food in the articles, the means of remitting wages, the allotment note, the establishment of seamen’s savings-banks, and various other important measures, all indicating as they do the earnest wish of the Legislature to secure the welfare of the sailor, received the most careful consideration by the Commissioners, with a view to their amendment where necessary. But, though some Shipowners were of opinion that the system did not work well, and that they should be allowed to engage seamen, as other employers engage their workmen, without the presence of a shipping master, the Commissioners were of opinion that the shipping offices had been of great value and ought to be maintained, tersely remarking that if the captain of a merchant ship would take trouble to seek out eligible men he could arrange to meet them at the shipping offices, indeed, could engage them on board or elsewhere under a special application.
The anxiety of Parliament to protect the seaman and, more especially, to treat him as incompetent to take care of himself, and as requiring the special interference of the Legislature, had exercised a prejudicial influence on his character, tending to destroy, as it did, the confidence which should ever exist between the master and his crew, and had frequently promoted insubordination at a time when good discipline was most essential to the safety of the vessel and all on board; moreover, the rule requiring misconduct on the part of a seaman to be entered in the log and immediately read to the offender was a contrivance so ill-calculated to promote good behaviour that masters frequently left offences unnoticed rather than resort to such a proceeding; the Commissioners recommended, therefore, that this plan should be materially modified (they do not state how), and that, to secure fair treatment for the seaman, without destroying discipline or weakening the authority of the master, should be the object of the Legislature.
Indeed, when it is considered that the safety of a merchant ship, as well as of the lives of the passengers and crew, are entrusted to the skill and judgment of the master, it is essential that his authority should be upheld, as any interference tending to impair his authority and to lower his position adds seriously to the dangers of navigation.
Power of masters.
As a ship at sea is in herself a little kingdom, the power of the master should be paramount and all but unquestioned; hence, while held strictly amenable to the law for any acts of tyranny and cruelty, the Legislature was bound to take care not to deprive him of the control necessary for the security of his vessel. Now, as the law as it at present stands, gives him very little power of punishing a sailor for anything but mutinous conduct, and as the sailor may be guilty with virtual impunity of many gross derelictions of duty, such as drunkenness, sleeping on the look-out, disobedience, and insubordination, the Commissioners recommend that some remedies, less cumbrous than those now existing, should be applied and more direct penalties inflicted.
Scheme for training boys for the sea.