18 JUNE 2003  

MR NICK STARLING, MR GRAEME HENDERSON, MR TIM GALLOWAY, MR RON WEBB AND MR PETER LANDLES

  Q420  Mrs Ellman: Yes; in relation to these issues of whether the people doing the jobs are actually competent to do them and have sufficient safety training for what they are actually doing.

  Mr Landles: On board ship no one at all at the moment, not in any port. When a ship enters harbour the port has no authority technically on board the ship if it is self handling. A number of ships do self-handle with either Polish crews or Chinese crews or whatever, but they do not come onto the quayside. They do lashing on board the ship and they intermingle with the permanent dock workers like ourselves and—it does not happen in Felixstowe but in other ports—we see that they have no idea what they are doing and they are throwing lashing bars which weigh 60lbs all over the place and we cannot even speak to them in English, never mind health and safety training. From that point of view of self handling, the accident rate will just go through the roof.

  Q421  Mrs Ellman: Will any of that change under the directive?

  Mr Landles: There is still a number of concerns with the directive from our point of view and we have been dealing with the minister concerned. We know how deals take place in Brussels and different countries want different things on self handling. In Great Britain our port structures are totally different to those in Italy or Spain who are pushing this very much because they do a lot of ro-ro work. For that they can use permanent Spanish or whatever workers, but when it comes to big container ships and they start carrying crews, as they could do, then you could get into a position where they are carrying a Chinese crew to unlash cargo to the landside.

  Q422  Chairman: It comes as a great shock to the Committee to learn that the Transport and General Workers' Union does not have its dock workers all speaking at least Mandarin. Is the government still working towards ratification of ILO152 on dock work?

  Mr Henderson: We are certainly looking at that and we intend to produce a report for the minister later this year.

  Q423  Chairman: "Looking at it"? You told us in one of your memorandums in 2001 that you were liaising with the ILO to enable the government to ratify.

  Mr Henderson: That is certainly the case. The ILO is currently engaged in quite a major revision of their code of practice on the dock convention 152 and we have been very active in contributing to that process. Indeed later this year in December, the ILO governing body has set up a committee of experts which will look to ratify that particular code of practice. We have been very much involved in that process. As far as the ratification of the convention itself is concerned, we have actually looked at this in some detail. The problem we have is that although the overwhelming majority of our legislation does comply with the convention, there are some areas where the convention is in conflict with European Union directives. We are looking at a way by which we can reconcile the two. We are going to report to the minister later this year on whether in fact legally we can go that last step to ratify formally.

  Q424  Chairman: I think we should give you a little practice. If you would you give the Committee a note on the differences and where you foresee problems, we should be very grateful for that.

  Mr Henderson: Certainly.

  Chairman: Gentlemen, you have all been extremely well organised in your self handling. Thank you for coming.