Merchant Shipping Act 1995

Last updated

Merchant Shipping Act 1995
Act of Parliament
Royal Coat of Arms of the United Kingdom (variant 1, 1952-2022).svg
Parliament of the United Kingdom
Long title An Act to consolidate the Merchant Shipping Acts 1894 to 1994 and other enactments relating to merchant shipping.
Citation 1995 c. 21
Territorial extent United Kingdom
Dates
Royal assent 19 July 1995
Commencement 1 January 1996
Other legislation
Amends Australia Act 1986
Repeals/revokes
Status: Amended
Text of statute as originally enacted
Revised text of statute as amended

The Merchant Shipping Act 1995 (c. 21) is an act of Parliament passed in the United Kingdom in 1995. It consolidated much of the UK's maritime legislation, repealing several acts in their entirety and provisions in many more, some dating back to the mid-nineteenth century. It appoints several officers of Admiralty Jurisdiction such as the Receiver of Wreck. The act of 1995 updates the prior Merchant Shipping Act 1894 (57 & 58 Vict. c. 60). The lead part on British ships was impacted by the outcome of the Factortame case, as the Merchant Shipping Act 1988 was impugned by the Common Fisheries Policy.

Contents

Content of act

The act comprises 316 sections divided into 13 Parts:

Part II: Registration

The Act details British law on entitlement for Ship registration, including qualifications, pre-conditions and the machinery for registration. [1]

Part VIII: Lighthouses

Part VIII of the Act provides the powers and duties of the general lighthouse authorities and local lighthouse authorities.

Part IX: Salvage and Wreck

Receiver of Wreck is a post defined in Part IX of the Act. It is an official of the British government whose main task is to process incoming reports of shipwrecks in order to give legitimate owners the opportunity to retrieve their property and ensure that law-abiding finders of wreck receive an appropriate reward. [2] According to the Act, a wreck falls into one of four categories:

Flotsam
goods lost from a ship which has sunk or otherwise perished which are recoverable because they have floated.
Jetsam
goods cast overboard (jettisoned) in order to lighten a vessel which is in danger of sinking, even if they ultimately perish.
Derelict
property which has been abandoned and deserted at sea by those who were in charge without any hope of recovering it. This includes vessels and cargo.
Lagan (or ligan)
goods cast overboard from a ship, which afterwards perish, buoyed so that they can be recovered later.

Part XI: Accident Investigations and Inquiries

Part XI of the Act provides the powers and duties of the Marine Accident Investigation Branch.

Subsequent amendments

The Merchant Shipping (Pollution) Act 2006 amended section 178(1) of the Act. It restricts claims to being enforced within three years of the damage occurring, whereas previously it had been restricted to within three years after "the claim against the Fund arose", and within six years of the damage occurring.

The Marine Navigation Act 2013 made four changes to the Act: [3]

See also

References

  1. ↑ Hill, Christopher Julius Starforth (1998). Maritime Law. London: Lloyd's of London Press Limited. p. 9. ISBN   978-1-85978-836-3.
  2. ↑ Maritime and Coastguard Agency Archived 20 November 2008 at the Wayback Machine - Role of the Receiver Of Wreck
  3. ↑ "Marine Navigation Act 2013: Explanatory Notes" (PDF). Parliament of the United Kingdom. April 2013. Retrieved 18 May 2013.

[[Category:Merchant Shipping Acts]

This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.