History of merchant shipping and ancient commerce, Volume 3 (of 4)

by W. S. Lindsay

Mr. W. J. Lamport and others.

Opinion of the Commissioners.

Such, also, was the purport of the evidence of the great majority, if not of all the witnesses examined before the Commission; but I quote that of Mr. Harper, because he is not merely thoroughly competent to offer an opinion on the subject, but is altogether disinterested. Indeed, from the appointment he holds, it would be to his interest to recommend a compulsory load-line, and he would no doubt have done so, had he not thought that any such legislative measure would be likely to aggravate the evils sought to be remedied. In fact, the whole tenor of the evidence is that a fixed load-line would do more harm than good.[297] And such was the opinion of the Commissioners, who state, “that any rule of freeboard founded on surplus buoyancy gives to a vessel of light scantling an advantage over a stronger vessel. Thus the inferior ship would by law be allowed to carry the heavier cargo. Such an enactment would not contribute to the safety of life at sea. From all the evidence we have collected on this subject, we are of opinion that an Act of Parliament enforcing any scale of freeboard would be mischievous.”... “A law presenting such a rule would therefore enhance the perils of a seafaring life.”

Nor can impartial persons who have studied this question arrive at any other conclusion, for as the Commissioners justly add, “There is no general agreement as to a rule by which the requisite amount of reserve buoyancy could be determined, and it appears that, except under definite circumstances, it is not a determinable problem. The proper load-line in each particular case depends not only upon the principal dimensions of the ship, but also upon her form and structural strength, the nature of her cargo, the voyage, and the season of the year.”

Voluntary load-line.

The Commissioners, consequently, limited their recommendation so far as regards freeboard to the extent that “every merchant ship should have marked upon each of her sides amidships, a vertical scale of feet downwards from the edge of her main-deck,” and that a note of her draught of water “should be entered in the log after the vessel has received her full load, immediately before the time of her starting on her voyage, which should, wherever practicable, be left with the officer of Customs or with the British Consul, by whom it should be recorded.”

Its value questionable.

This recommendation was proposed to be carried out in the Government Bill which was withdrawn, but, in the Act now temporarily in force, the provisions are somewhat different. The advantages of either system are problematical. Shipowners will continue, as they have hitherto done, to load their vessels to such draught as they consider prudent, and if one of their vessels is lost, and other persons remark that she was too heavily laden, the answer will either be that the draught was as usual, or that safety in proportion to depth is a matter of opinion depending on many varying circumstances. The mere fact of publicly recording the draught of water would, it is to be feared, have little effect on unprincipled or avaricious Shipowners, against whom alone the law is aimed. Practically, I think the system of marking now in force will be of little or no avail, and that the result will not be as the framers of the law intended. A Shipowner being now required by law to mark upon the sides of the vessel amidships a circular disc 12 inches in diameter, to be so placed that “the centre of the disc shall indicate the maximum load-line in salt water to which the owner intends to load the ship for that voyage,” will perceive that to place the disc only slightly above the usual line of load draught would, on the one hand, fetter him to some extent; while, on the other hand, he would incur no disadvantage by placing it so much higher as to ensure its being well clear of the water under any circumstances of loading. A maximum load-line will, therefore, in practice mean the line down to which the ship will certainly not be loaded. Indeed, from the information I have gained on the subject, the practice with some Shipowners seems already to be that the discs are placed one, two, and in some cases, three and even four feet above the water-line. The mere marking it would, therefore, appear in a great measure worthless, as surveyors will still require to wait until a ship has her cargo on board and is ready for sea, before they can form any opinion as to her safety. Whether it is wise, on the part of Shipowners, to place the disc so far above the vessel’s ordinary water-line as to make it meaningless has been doubted by many, but the fact remains that it is so placed in very many instances. It would, certainly, have been better to have omitted from the clause of the Act I have just quoted the word “maximum,” as few Shipowners would have placed their discs too high if, by doing so, this indicated an intention on their part to overload their vessels.

However, if it can be shown that this new mode of marking the sides of a ship tends in any degree towards the greater safety of life and property at sea, the shipping community, generally, will not complain of the expense and trouble. In all good governments there is a pervading principle to which all classes submit, that the interests of the few must be made subservient to the good of the many, and that, especially where life is at stake, no reasonable trouble or expense should be spared to preserve it. But if, on the other hand, it is found that this system of marking or registering the draught of water is useless, or even injurious, Shipowners will have great cause of complaint against Government for an unnecessary interference with their business, provided they can show that they have made an earnest endeavour to apply the provisions of the Act fairly and in the spirit in which they were framed.[298]

The other important point on which Mr. Plimsoll insisted is of a different character. But to carry it out in the way suggested, or as it was argued in the House of Commons and before the Royal Commission, would be impracticable, and even if practicable, it would be most mischievous: the Commissioners in their Report state the question as follows:—“With the view of providing for the greater safety of life at sea, it has been suggested that the Board of Trade shall superintend the construction, the periodical inspection, the repair, and the loading of all British Merchant Ships.” Considering the extent of our mercantile marine and the mode in which business must, necessarily, be conducted if we desire to maintain our present high position as a maritime nation, any such suggestion is simply absurd and, if carried into effect, would be most ruinous. That we have already too much legislation in matters of detail the Commissioners themselves admit. Referring to the pernicious effects of inquiry into such matters by Government surveyors on Emigrant ships, they say, and from the evidence before them they would have been justified in expressing their opinion in still stronger terms, “We consider it to be a question worthy of serious consideration, whether, in the case of passenger ships, the certificate of the Board of Trade, so far as regards specific approval, should not be expressly confined to the number of passengers to be allowed, and to the accommodation for their health, comfort, and general security; all questions of unseaworthiness of hull, machinery, and equipment being left to the owners, subject only to a general power of interference in case of danger, sufficiently apparent to justify special intervention.”