10-02-2019, 09:38 AM
RD II: Not our Indaba – however. 
Previous reference:
New Chair, new members, old members and Sterlo with shit still on his liver....
Some very interesting and historical regulator parallels (AMSA v CASA) from the Hansard of last week's Brisvegas public hearing into the performance of AMSA (Senate inquiry MKII)...
On AMSA implementing and overseeing SMS:
Pacific Maritime Lawyers Pty. Ltd.
Senator STERLE: ...So my question is: can you point to any other specific countries that the committee should be looking towards as examples of best practice with regard to implementation of safety management systems?
Mr Kavanagh : Other nations? Thank you for the question. I'm not sure I can give an opinion about other nations. Certainly—
Senator STERLE: [/url]Or examples.
Mr Kavanagh : Certainly, the UK, and Australia, I have to say, were at the forefront of the international ship management code, which is the big-ship version of what we're talking about. It is internationally accepted, and every ship that comes into Australia is compliant with that code. So I think there is universal acceptance and international implementation of international ship management codes and safety management systems, however you want to describe them.
The real challenge for Australia and the domestic commercial vessel jurisdiction, which is what we're talking about, as I understand it, is that the application to the small-ship world, if you like, is uneven. There are some very significant challenges with that. When you're talking about international shipping, there are minimum international standards and training and qualifications, and there are a whole lot more resources, financial and otherwise, and support systems to ensure the implementation of those systems. When you are talking about sometimes very small businesses operating commercial vessels, those resources are not the same; they're not available. And the quality of safety management systems, in my experience, varies very widely. That's a real challenge. When you're hanging your hat—in the legislation and indeed your whole regulatory system—on an effective safety management system as being the primary defence against incidents of this nature, then you really need to make sure the quality of those safety management systems is appropriate to the operation of that vessel.
[url=https://parlinfo.aph.gov.au/parlInfo/search/display/display.w3p;query=Id%3A%22handbook%2Fallmps%2Fe68%22;querytype=;rec=0]Senator STERLE: You noted in your submission that AMSA provides very limited support for the development of a safety management system. What further steps could AMSA take to engage with vessel owners and masters regarding the importance of SMSs?
Dr Marinac : What I would suggest, without wanting to be too philosophical, is that the place to start here is with a regulatory philosophy and regulatory approach. If AMSA continues to see itself as we certainly see it, acting as an enforcement regulator, as a compliance based police of the industry, then there is less space in which the industry could be having sensible conversations with AMSA about what a positive SMS should look like; what sort of content should be in the SMS; and, where things go wrong, the chances of the learning from each error to be disseminated elsewhere throughout the industry. There is a significant risk for a maritime operator in having a discussion with AMSA about things that are going wrong or things that can be improved, when, at the same time that they're having that conversation, they're well aware that they're talking to their potential prosecutor. So, if the approach taken by AMSA was more in accordance with its public statements, more about cooperation with the industry and a cooperative approach to safety, then that would achieve a more effective outcome than a compliance based, prosecution based approach to regulation.
In the same way, we are talking about applying safety management systems to an incredible variety of vessels undertaking an incredible variety of functions in an incredible variety of circumstances. So it's going to be impossible under any circumstances to really regulate in detail what those safety management systems should look like. If ever there were an area that was crying out for principles based regulation, this is it, because no two boats are the same, no two voyages are the same and no two emergencies are the same, so the safety management system has to be designed to anticipate those as best as possible, in the knowledge that the safety management system will never completely anticipate everything once things start to go wrong.
What all of that means in our view is that the less AMSA looks like a Commonwealth version of the water police, the better, and the more AMSA is able to sit down around a table and talk about safety with the operators of the vessels before anything goes wrong, the better. Some of the mechanisms already exist in the legislation—for instance, the enforceable undertakings. At the moment, we're not aware, in any event, of enforceable undertakings being used at all. So, if we have an operator who says, 'This is a problem; this has gone wrong,' what we would like them to be able to do is to go to AMSA and say, 'This is the problem we've had; this is where it's not going right,' for them to be able to enter into an enforceable undertaking which protects them from prosecution in relation to that but also enables them to have a sensible conversation with the regulator about how to make sure these things don't go wrong again...
...Mr Kavanagh : I have a couple of things that I might say about that. The first is that, clearly, you're right. The safety management system is the key, and, clearly, the safety management system in place on that vessel on that day was inadequate. It was inadequate both in its form and in its implementation. I don't think I'm saying anything controversial there; that's certainly what the coroner gave a view upon.
In my experience, and I include in my experience 10 years as a state regulator of marine safety, the overwhelming majority of incidents are caused by operational error—the failure to implement the safety management system. Yet, and this was also the case in the states, the great majority of the resources are put into the structure of the vessel—making sure that the number of lifejackets is right, that the design is adequate and so on. It's looking at the kit, if you like. I'm not saying that's wrong to do—of course the boats need to be seaworthy; that's absolutely the foundation—but it's also easy to do that.
Senator STERLE: That's right.
Mr Kavanagh : It's easy to see whether the vessel is seaworthy or not. It's much harder, as a regulator, to verify that the operation of the vessel is safe and that the implementation of the SMS is being done in accordance with what the SMS says. That's exactly the cause of this incident in my view.
So that leads you to the place where AMSA as a regulator is spending the great majority of its time. Please indulge my reading out the figures for the first 12 months of the AMSA supervision of the national system: 3,000 vessel permissions, 4,500 operating permissions, 3,100 exemptions, 10,300 certificates of competency, 9,000 certificates issued, reflecting the new survey regime. There were also 1,500 inspections and 400 SMS verifications. I'm not entirely sure what an 'SMS verification' means, but if you're only looking at 400 out of tens of thousands of vessels—that's actually where the safety is and that's actually where this incident happened—I suggest that perhaps the allocation of resources needs to be looked at. We're doing the paperwork fine, there are a lot of people on boats with pieces of paper, but perhaps the safety management systems and the way that they're being conducted needs to be looked at.
From Maritime Union of Australia session:
Senator RENNICK: The previous witnesses are, I think, pushing a safety management system. What's your view on that?
Mr Keane : It's interesting that they're pushing safety management. I went to a consultation for the fishing industry with local fishermen at Jervis Bay the other day. They sat there and spent a considerable amount of time with the guys. The people who were representing AMSA were quite good. They were very patient with the guys and went through how to do a risk assessment and how to do the safety management systems. One of the guys in the room said: 'Mate, this is all good, but the blokes you have in this room are the only guys who are actually concerned with safety. What are you going to do with the cowboys? They're not going to be here. They're not going to learn that.' Safety management systems are quite good and it's about common sense. We agree with it across the board, but it must be underpinned by decent regulation. There really isn't an industry in the country now that doesn't do some risk assessment for everything they do, but there should be some minimum standards that they have to comply with. That example—
Senator RENNICK: The issue with the safety management system is that it's not compulsory.
Mr Bray : It's not and it doesn't do anything. It's not until after the event when something goes wrong and they have to prosecute. The Spirit of 1770 is a prime example. That guy was prosecuted for using his phone rather than the radio, because it was written that way in the SMS. It's ludicrous; it's madness. But that's what these guys will be facing when they're just learning how to do this. That was for guys who were fishing inshore—basically not going more than a mile or two out, like a lot of lobster divers and that sort of thing. There are the regulations—and remember: they have to do their own systems. Compile that out when you go onto trading vessels—proper commercial vessels that are carrying cargo. If they're allowed to have their own minimum safety standards or are allowed to take somebody on board who's done a three-day course to become a GPH and, all of a sudden, they can work 200 miles out to sea—that was never the intention of the GPH course, but that's what's going to come out of some of this. It's quite funny that, when we're talking about doing risk assessments and safety management service, I want to know who's done the risk assessment on making some of these changes from AMSA's position, because we don't see any data that backs up any need for these changes. They're deregulating the industry and dumbing down our qualifications...
Senator Brockman and the MUA on self/over regulation in comparison to CASA:
Mr Keane : We think there are some complications with this where they're trying to appease the fishing industry and not overregulate what they do. There's an ability to split that off. I think we mentioned that in the submission. We're not adverse to that. But, once you're talking about a DCV that's carrying cargo or an oceangoing vessel, they have to have those minimum requirements as a regulation.
Senator RENNICK: Thank you.
Senator BROCKMAN: On the same area, this committee is trying to tackle what you brought up in passing, Mr Bray, in your opening statement: the role of CASA and the airline industry. But we hear—this committee in particular pretty constantly hears—from the general aviation sector that the level of regulation is actually strangling them and general aviation is in decline as a result. Do you have any views as to whether a more prescriptive regime would actually potentially weaken the sector rather than strengthening it?
Mr Keane : You'd have to ask: would any of the people that are raising those concerns agree to dumb down the training for their pilots? A couple of us went before the Productivity Commission and we were talking to them about general stuff and how the act has gone since it was implemented—they had to do their own review. We raised then some of the issues that we've raised here today. One of the people on the committee that came out of the industry said, 'We would not consider that if it were the aviation industry.' He said that could not be considered in the aviation industry. Yet we do it every day on vessels that are carrying passengers, carrying equal numbers—all that sort of stuff. So, to answer your question, I don't think dumbing down any part of the training or dropping qualifications can benefit any industry particularly.
Senator BROCKMAN: No. I wasn't talking about qualifications in particular. I was talking about the level of oversight, the level of bureaucracy and the level of box-ticking that inevitably comes with increased regulation.
Mr Bray : As a seafarer—and I spent 19 years on various vessels in various parts of the industry—I would say that we can always look at improving the bureaucracy and the efficiencies around red tape. There's no issue with that. One of the things that I remember seafarers largely complained about when they were at sea was that they had their job to do and then they had to do the paperwork. Those functions were getting more and more overbearing and it was leading to issues in relation to fatigue. So in fact those bureaucratic processes and the paper shuffling were in themselves placing a greater burden on safety.
However, having said that, seafarers were professional in every standard, in every way. I wouldn't say that they behaved that way 100 per cent of the time, but in their life on board a ship, when they went to sea, they knew that the best lifeboat was the ship that they were on and not the lifesaving apparatus that you were reliant on. In that way, they went about their roles diligently. If you asked a seafarer back then, they would tell you that, yes, they had the shits with the bureaucratic processes—no doubt. But, if you said to them, 'Let's go after efficiencies and erode some of the safety standards or conditions or the professionalisms under the qualification', you would have got kick-back and concern.
I will give you this example. I left the Aurora Australis in 1996. I had spent five years on there. That's the icebreaker that goes down to Antarctica. Three of those crew members were in my bridal party when I married my wife. I left the ship and they sailed and it caught fire on that next trip. They had to fight the fire. It was an engine room fire. They spent 24 hours fighting the fire because the fuelling process for the fire was a split fuel hose. So the fuel was spraying out and they couldn't get down to shut the fuel off, so it was just spraying out and melting the ship, down there at sea. They got the fire out eventually—someone got in and risked their life and shut the fuel down—and they had to rebuild two melted engines to get back to sea. One of the things that they all said in the debriefs was: had they not been trained and had the safety systems in place on that ship, it wasn't only the crew that was facing loss of life; there were 109 expeditioners on board at that particular time.
I can only go back to those work colleagues of mine, who are my friends in personal life as well. They say to us that it was a time when the investment in training, knowledge and process actually worked. They never want to have a second go at trying it, but it worked at the time and it didn't fail them then. Our job, and our obligation, is to make sure that it doesn't fail for a future cruise in those particular circumstances...
Anyhow for what it's worth (IMO), well worth a read...P2
Previous reference:
(04-03-2019, 08:05 AM)Kharon Wrote: AMSA v RRAT. Round 1.
No video of this hit out; the Hansard is published, about 20 pages of solid reading to plough through. Nothing whatsoever to with matters aeronautical – but of interest as a guide to what we may expect when CASA gets a turn. I know not many will read the Hansard – but for me it was (a) a required task and (b) it provides an insight to how Government agencies ‘think’ and operate; so in that sense, valuable. However, I have selected a few passages of play which reflect the Committee’s mood – in the matter being discussed. The session should be a wake up call for the ASA, ATSB and CASA, IMO there is a push on to upset the cosy, easy going attitude in which these agencies have cocooned themselves for far too long. It could just be that that the insulation against serious questioning, with venom is failing and the isolated splendour of ‘Safety’ as an endless trough is ending. We can only hope. Brockman, Gallacher, Patrick and Sterle were not there to kill spiders; it was good work by a fine team. Some of Glenn Sterle’s bowling is worth a few minutes, the closing remarks in particular.
Anyway – FWIW:–
ACTING CHAIR: because we're going to be back here, guaranteed—safer bet than Winx. Colleagues, if you want to have a chat outside, we can suspend for a minute and have a chat.
Mr Kinley: Thanks, Senator. I would like to make a short opening statement. But, before I do that, we did, of course, listen to the hearings in Perth for this inquiry. I would like to say that we apologise for not doing better in keeping our communications open with Mrs Nicole Mills. We did listen, in particular, to her evidence, and we will certainly do better in future. We will follow up on her suggestion to nominate a contact officer in such cases as this. What I do need to work out is what would be the appropriate training for our officers to be able to handle those sorts of issues properly and sensitively.
Prosecuting matters under the national law though remains complex and difficult, and AMSA recently met with the CDPP to discuss these ongoing issues. One matter we will be seeking legislative amendments for is to allow at least two years to commence proceedings rather than the one year now allowed under the Crimes Act for offences warranting less than six months imprisonment. We also suggest that the offences under the act be examined to consider if they're adequate for a matter involving a fatality. In this regard I would draw the committee's attention to the uncommenced amendments to the national law act that were intended to align the act with the health and safety laws with similar offences and penalties.
ACTING CHAIR: If you want to overrule me, that's fine. We'll do a count very quickly. I want everything on the record. We have deaths that have not been investigated by this mob, and all we've seen—you can smile as much as you like, Mr McKenzie, and whisper in your mate's ear or whatever you want to do. You people really are on the verge—I tell you: if I was the minister, none of you would even be sitting here unless you started owning up to whose incompetence led to this.
ACTING CHAIR: Mr Kinley, I'll talk to you, as the CEO, about what we have learnt recently in your term as the CEO, taking over under the national law. What brought this to our attention was the very unfortunate death of Mr Mills. As I said earlier, we're not going to stop here, because we know there have been so many more. For the families out there I'm going to mention Glen Wilson; Ryan Donohue; Ian Thompson; Paul McVeigh; Leila Trott; Murray Turner; Mason Carter; Chad Fairley; Andrew Kelly; Allan Russell; John Rodgers; Matthew Roberts; David Chivers; Martin Cunningham; one person on the Seabring; three people on a night raid, Luke Murray, Daniel Bradshaw and Tim Macpherson; Ben Leahy; Adam Bidner; Adam Hoffman; Zach Feeney; Chris Sammut; Eli Tonks; Harry Evans; Shalina Abdul Hussien plus about twenty more people who I'm not able to name, because no-one seems to collect the information. All these people have been killed on Australian vessels since AMSA took responsibility for the national system in 2013.
After what we learnt about the death of Mr Mills, I have absolutely no confidence that AMSA has done everything that it could have done to secure safety. I've got no confidence about the safety of workers or members of the public on other vessels. You could say that you've inherited a system that is a basket case, poor safety culture—all of that. What I don't understand where the plan is to improve this situation is. Looking at these numbers, they have got to be about the same as, or worse than, other dangerous industries, and it has been a priority industry for focus and action for Safe Work Australia. They have industry plans; they have safety codes of practice. I ask: where is your action and focus? All I see is vessels cobbling together—in my own words—their own safety management systems. I believe a lot of rules are made up, and they put as many people as they like on a vessel. If they don't like the basic rules that are there, I'm told they can go and talk to their mates on the AMSA board and get an exemption. When they do get in trouble or someone is killed, in my view, AMSA looks the other way.
I looked at your annual report hoping to find something to indicate that you have a plan. I'll talk about the chairman's report. I see that you have a new computer system, that there are plans to maintain your workforce, to deal with oil spills, for ship-sourced garbage, for new navigation systems, and that there have been important meetings in London. There is nothing about fatalities until you get to page 54. On page 54 it tells me that there were nine fatalities just last year, and this is not a huge industry. This was in your KPIs, coded amber, which I saw on page 12 is classified by AMSA as a 'minor' issue. There's nothing in there about what you're going to do to fix it. On page 23 it says that operators will be encouraged to take responsibility for safety outcomes. I can tell you all that that's not a plan to save people; that's a plan for more deaths, like the unfortunate death of Mr Mills.
People are dying and it looks to me like no-one is held accountable and, worse, no-one thinks that it's a problem that should be fixed. I hope that you're not willing to look the other way. I believe the minister has been trying to look the other way—that's my view, not the committee's—but I'm not going to look the other way and I know that the committee won't either. Election or no election, as I said earlier, we will get to the bottom of this. We will be looking at your marine orders, your legislation and your operation—everything that you do or don't do—and we will fix this. I'll leave it at that.
That concludes today's hearing. With the approval of my colleagues, we've set 15 April for questions on notice. Thank you very much.
Toot – toot….
New Chair, new members, old members and Sterlo with shit still on his liver....
Some very interesting and historical regulator parallels (AMSA v CASA) from the Hansard of last week's Brisvegas public hearing into the performance of AMSA (Senate inquiry MKII)...
Quote:25 Sep 2019 Brisbane, QLD (HTML & PDF) ProgramSubmissions
On AMSA implementing and overseeing SMS:
Pacific Maritime Lawyers Pty. Ltd.
Senator STERLE: ...So my question is: can you point to any other specific countries that the committee should be looking towards as examples of best practice with regard to implementation of safety management systems?
Mr Kavanagh : Other nations? Thank you for the question. I'm not sure I can give an opinion about other nations. Certainly—
Senator STERLE: [/url]Or examples.
Mr Kavanagh : Certainly, the UK, and Australia, I have to say, were at the forefront of the international ship management code, which is the big-ship version of what we're talking about. It is internationally accepted, and every ship that comes into Australia is compliant with that code. So I think there is universal acceptance and international implementation of international ship management codes and safety management systems, however you want to describe them.
The real challenge for Australia and the domestic commercial vessel jurisdiction, which is what we're talking about, as I understand it, is that the application to the small-ship world, if you like, is uneven. There are some very significant challenges with that. When you're talking about international shipping, there are minimum international standards and training and qualifications, and there are a whole lot more resources, financial and otherwise, and support systems to ensure the implementation of those systems. When you are talking about sometimes very small businesses operating commercial vessels, those resources are not the same; they're not available. And the quality of safety management systems, in my experience, varies very widely. That's a real challenge. When you're hanging your hat—in the legislation and indeed your whole regulatory system—on an effective safety management system as being the primary defence against incidents of this nature, then you really need to make sure the quality of those safety management systems is appropriate to the operation of that vessel.
[url=https://parlinfo.aph.gov.au/parlInfo/search/display/display.w3p;query=Id%3A%22handbook%2Fallmps%2Fe68%22;querytype=;rec=0]Senator STERLE: You noted in your submission that AMSA provides very limited support for the development of a safety management system. What further steps could AMSA take to engage with vessel owners and masters regarding the importance of SMSs?
Dr Marinac : What I would suggest, without wanting to be too philosophical, is that the place to start here is with a regulatory philosophy and regulatory approach. If AMSA continues to see itself as we certainly see it, acting as an enforcement regulator, as a compliance based police of the industry, then there is less space in which the industry could be having sensible conversations with AMSA about what a positive SMS should look like; what sort of content should be in the SMS; and, where things go wrong, the chances of the learning from each error to be disseminated elsewhere throughout the industry. There is a significant risk for a maritime operator in having a discussion with AMSA about things that are going wrong or things that can be improved, when, at the same time that they're having that conversation, they're well aware that they're talking to their potential prosecutor. So, if the approach taken by AMSA was more in accordance with its public statements, more about cooperation with the industry and a cooperative approach to safety, then that would achieve a more effective outcome than a compliance based, prosecution based approach to regulation.
In the same way, we are talking about applying safety management systems to an incredible variety of vessels undertaking an incredible variety of functions in an incredible variety of circumstances. So it's going to be impossible under any circumstances to really regulate in detail what those safety management systems should look like. If ever there were an area that was crying out for principles based regulation, this is it, because no two boats are the same, no two voyages are the same and no two emergencies are the same, so the safety management system has to be designed to anticipate those as best as possible, in the knowledge that the safety management system will never completely anticipate everything once things start to go wrong.
What all of that means in our view is that the less AMSA looks like a Commonwealth version of the water police, the better, and the more AMSA is able to sit down around a table and talk about safety with the operators of the vessels before anything goes wrong, the better. Some of the mechanisms already exist in the legislation—for instance, the enforceable undertakings. At the moment, we're not aware, in any event, of enforceable undertakings being used at all. So, if we have an operator who says, 'This is a problem; this has gone wrong,' what we would like them to be able to do is to go to AMSA and say, 'This is the problem we've had; this is where it's not going right,' for them to be able to enter into an enforceable undertaking which protects them from prosecution in relation to that but also enables them to have a sensible conversation with the regulator about how to make sure these things don't go wrong again...
...Mr Kavanagh : I have a couple of things that I might say about that. The first is that, clearly, you're right. The safety management system is the key, and, clearly, the safety management system in place on that vessel on that day was inadequate. It was inadequate both in its form and in its implementation. I don't think I'm saying anything controversial there; that's certainly what the coroner gave a view upon.
In my experience, and I include in my experience 10 years as a state regulator of marine safety, the overwhelming majority of incidents are caused by operational error—the failure to implement the safety management system. Yet, and this was also the case in the states, the great majority of the resources are put into the structure of the vessel—making sure that the number of lifejackets is right, that the design is adequate and so on. It's looking at the kit, if you like. I'm not saying that's wrong to do—of course the boats need to be seaworthy; that's absolutely the foundation—but it's also easy to do that.
Senator STERLE: That's right.
Mr Kavanagh : It's easy to see whether the vessel is seaworthy or not. It's much harder, as a regulator, to verify that the operation of the vessel is safe and that the implementation of the SMS is being done in accordance with what the SMS says. That's exactly the cause of this incident in my view.
So that leads you to the place where AMSA as a regulator is spending the great majority of its time. Please indulge my reading out the figures for the first 12 months of the AMSA supervision of the national system: 3,000 vessel permissions, 4,500 operating permissions, 3,100 exemptions, 10,300 certificates of competency, 9,000 certificates issued, reflecting the new survey regime. There were also 1,500 inspections and 400 SMS verifications. I'm not entirely sure what an 'SMS verification' means, but if you're only looking at 400 out of tens of thousands of vessels—that's actually where the safety is and that's actually where this incident happened—I suggest that perhaps the allocation of resources needs to be looked at. We're doing the paperwork fine, there are a lot of people on boats with pieces of paper, but perhaps the safety management systems and the way that they're being conducted needs to be looked at.
From Maritime Union of Australia session:
Senator RENNICK: The previous witnesses are, I think, pushing a safety management system. What's your view on that?
Mr Keane : It's interesting that they're pushing safety management. I went to a consultation for the fishing industry with local fishermen at Jervis Bay the other day. They sat there and spent a considerable amount of time with the guys. The people who were representing AMSA were quite good. They were very patient with the guys and went through how to do a risk assessment and how to do the safety management systems. One of the guys in the room said: 'Mate, this is all good, but the blokes you have in this room are the only guys who are actually concerned with safety. What are you going to do with the cowboys? They're not going to be here. They're not going to learn that.' Safety management systems are quite good and it's about common sense. We agree with it across the board, but it must be underpinned by decent regulation. There really isn't an industry in the country now that doesn't do some risk assessment for everything they do, but there should be some minimum standards that they have to comply with. That example—
Senator RENNICK: The issue with the safety management system is that it's not compulsory.
Mr Bray : It's not and it doesn't do anything. It's not until after the event when something goes wrong and they have to prosecute. The Spirit of 1770 is a prime example. That guy was prosecuted for using his phone rather than the radio, because it was written that way in the SMS. It's ludicrous; it's madness. But that's what these guys will be facing when they're just learning how to do this. That was for guys who were fishing inshore—basically not going more than a mile or two out, like a lot of lobster divers and that sort of thing. There are the regulations—and remember: they have to do their own systems. Compile that out when you go onto trading vessels—proper commercial vessels that are carrying cargo. If they're allowed to have their own minimum safety standards or are allowed to take somebody on board who's done a three-day course to become a GPH and, all of a sudden, they can work 200 miles out to sea—that was never the intention of the GPH course, but that's what's going to come out of some of this. It's quite funny that, when we're talking about doing risk assessments and safety management service, I want to know who's done the risk assessment on making some of these changes from AMSA's position, because we don't see any data that backs up any need for these changes. They're deregulating the industry and dumbing down our qualifications...
Senator Brockman and the MUA on self/over regulation in comparison to CASA:
Mr Keane : We think there are some complications with this where they're trying to appease the fishing industry and not overregulate what they do. There's an ability to split that off. I think we mentioned that in the submission. We're not adverse to that. But, once you're talking about a DCV that's carrying cargo or an oceangoing vessel, they have to have those minimum requirements as a regulation.
Senator RENNICK: Thank you.
Senator BROCKMAN: On the same area, this committee is trying to tackle what you brought up in passing, Mr Bray, in your opening statement: the role of CASA and the airline industry. But we hear—this committee in particular pretty constantly hears—from the general aviation sector that the level of regulation is actually strangling them and general aviation is in decline as a result. Do you have any views as to whether a more prescriptive regime would actually potentially weaken the sector rather than strengthening it?
Quote:...There are problems with the legislative framework. Responsibility is split between the DCV Act and the Navigation Act. I just want to draw your attention here: imagine if passenger planes flying between Perth and Sydney were subject to different safety regulations to a plane flying from Sydney to Bangkok, that if Virgin could do their risk assessments and decide that one pilot was sufficient, that a steward or stewardess didn't need to do safety training and have first aid certificates, that the plane needed to be inspected thoroughly only every five years or that they could hire a pilot with a recreational licence and no experience other than with a single-engine Cessna. It sounds ludicrous, yet this is the case with commercial vessels in Australia. Responsibility is split between AMSA and the WHS regulators. AMSA say they are not a safety regulator; state safety regulators say they're not maritime regulators. There's a clear gap in the understanding, hence leading to some of the confusion amongst not only the employers but also the workers, who have a duty of care to themselves, their workmates and their colleagues on board the vessels. That's a significant problem...
Mr Keane : You'd have to ask: would any of the people that are raising those concerns agree to dumb down the training for their pilots? A couple of us went before the Productivity Commission and we were talking to them about general stuff and how the act has gone since it was implemented—they had to do their own review. We raised then some of the issues that we've raised here today. One of the people on the committee that came out of the industry said, 'We would not consider that if it were the aviation industry.' He said that could not be considered in the aviation industry. Yet we do it every day on vessels that are carrying passengers, carrying equal numbers—all that sort of stuff. So, to answer your question, I don't think dumbing down any part of the training or dropping qualifications can benefit any industry particularly.
Senator BROCKMAN: No. I wasn't talking about qualifications in particular. I was talking about the level of oversight, the level of bureaucracy and the level of box-ticking that inevitably comes with increased regulation.
Mr Bray : As a seafarer—and I spent 19 years on various vessels in various parts of the industry—I would say that we can always look at improving the bureaucracy and the efficiencies around red tape. There's no issue with that. One of the things that I remember seafarers largely complained about when they were at sea was that they had their job to do and then they had to do the paperwork. Those functions were getting more and more overbearing and it was leading to issues in relation to fatigue. So in fact those bureaucratic processes and the paper shuffling were in themselves placing a greater burden on safety.
However, having said that, seafarers were professional in every standard, in every way. I wouldn't say that they behaved that way 100 per cent of the time, but in their life on board a ship, when they went to sea, they knew that the best lifeboat was the ship that they were on and not the lifesaving apparatus that you were reliant on. In that way, they went about their roles diligently. If you asked a seafarer back then, they would tell you that, yes, they had the shits with the bureaucratic processes—no doubt. But, if you said to them, 'Let's go after efficiencies and erode some of the safety standards or conditions or the professionalisms under the qualification', you would have got kick-back and concern.
I will give you this example. I left the Aurora Australis in 1996. I had spent five years on there. That's the icebreaker that goes down to Antarctica. Three of those crew members were in my bridal party when I married my wife. I left the ship and they sailed and it caught fire on that next trip. They had to fight the fire. It was an engine room fire. They spent 24 hours fighting the fire because the fuelling process for the fire was a split fuel hose. So the fuel was spraying out and they couldn't get down to shut the fuel off, so it was just spraying out and melting the ship, down there at sea. They got the fire out eventually—someone got in and risked their life and shut the fuel down—and they had to rebuild two melted engines to get back to sea. One of the things that they all said in the debriefs was: had they not been trained and had the safety systems in place on that ship, it wasn't only the crew that was facing loss of life; there were 109 expeditioners on board at that particular time.
I can only go back to those work colleagues of mine, who are my friends in personal life as well. They say to us that it was a time when the investment in training, knowledge and process actually worked. They never want to have a second go at trying it, but it worked at the time and it didn't fail them then. Our job, and our obligation, is to make sure that it doesn't fail for a future cruise in those particular circumstances...
Anyhow for what it's worth (IMO), well worth a read...P2