26 February 1998 A4-0068/98

**II

RECOMMENDATION FOR SECOND READING

on the common position established by the Council with a view to the adoption of a Council Directive on the registration of persons aboard passenger ships operating to or from of the Member States of the Community (C4-0620/97 - 96/0281(SYN))

Committee on Transport and Tourism

Rapporteur: Mr Mark Francis Watts

PE 224.972/def. C O N T E N T S

Page

Procedural page...... 3

A. DRAFT DECISION...... 4

B. EXPLANATORY STATEMENT ...... 7

-2- PE 224.972/def. At its sitting of 29 May 1997 Parliament delivered its opinion at first reading on the proposal for a Council Directive on the registration of persons aboard passenger ships operating to or from ports of the Member States of the Community.

At the sitting of 18 December 1997 the President of Parliament announced that the common position had been received and referred to the Committee on Transport and Tourism as the committee responsible and to the Committee on Budgets for its opinion.

At its meeting of 28 October 1996 the committee had appointed Mr Mark Francis Watts rapporteur.

It considered the common position and the draft recommendation for second reading at its meetings of 19 January 1998, 3 February 1998 and 25 February 1998.

At the last meeting it adopted the draft decision unanimously with 1 abstention.

The following took part in the vote: Wijsenbeek, acting chairman and vice-chairman; Lüttge and Sisó Cruellas, vice-chairmen; Watts, rapporteur; Aparício Sánchez, Bennasar Tous (for Sarlis), Bernardini (forBaldarelli), Camisón Asensio, Castricum, Cornelissen, Danesin, van Dam, van Dijk, Grosch, Jarzembowski, Klironomos, Koch, Langenhagen, McIntosh, Novo Belenguer (for González Triviño), Piecyk, Schlechter, Schmidbauer, Simpson, Sindal, Stenmarck, Stockmann (for Seal) and Swoboda.

The recommendation for second reading was tabled on 26 febraury 1998.

The deadline for tabling amendments to the common position or proposals to reject it will be indicated in the draft agenda for the relevant part-session.

-3- PE 224.972/def. A DRAFT DECISION

Decision on the common position established by the Council with a view to the adoption of a Council Directive on the registration of persons aboard passenger ships operating to or from ports of the Member States of the Community (C4-0620/97 - 96/0281(SYN))

(Cooperation procedure: second reading)

The European Parliament,

- having regard to the common position of the Council, C4-0620/97 - 96/0281(SYN),

- having regard to its opinion at first reading(1 ) on the Commission proposal to the Council, COM(96)0574(2 ),

- having been consulted by the Council pursuant to Article 189c of the EC Treaty,

- having regard to Rule 67 of its Rules of Procedure,

- having regard to the recommendation for second reading of the Committee on Transport and Tourism (A4-0068/98),

1. Amends the common position as follows;

2. Instructs its President to forward this decision to the Council and Commission.

(Amendment 1) Recital 2

2. Whereas the Community is seriously 2. Whereas the Community is seriously concerned by shipping accidents involving concerned by the limited progress in the safety passenger ships which have resulted in massive of of passengers in the loss of life, particularly those involving the eleven years since the accident of the passenger "Herald of Free Enterprise" and the "Estonia"; ferry "Herald of Free Enterprise" on the 6th March 1987, which caused the loss of 191 lives and the "Estonia" on the 28th of September 1994; (rest unchanged)

______(1 ) OJ C 182, 16.6.1997, p. 31. (2 ) OJ C 31, 31.1.1997, p. 5

-4- PE 224.972/def. (Amendment 2) Recital 2 bis (new)

Whereas the lack of political will to improve the safety aspects of maritime transport and the setting aside of the recommendations included in the Sheen report, drawn in the aftermath of the "Herald of Free Enterprise" disaster, have resulted in the continuation of this unsatisfactory situation;

(Amendment 3) Recital 8 bis (new)

Whereas safety standards for the design and building of Ro-Ro passenger vessels, including watertight bulkheads and sponsons, are required urgently and must be included in the future measures to improve safety at sea;

(Amendment 4) Article 1a (new)

1a. This Directive shall also apply to all 'under sea' rail tunnels involving car shuttle journeys in excess of twenty miles.

(Amendment 5) Article 3(1)

This Directive shall apply to passenger ships This Directive shall apply to all 'under sea' rail with the exception of: tunnels involving car shuttle journeys of more than twenty miles and to passenger ships with the exception of: - ships of war and troop ships; and - ships of war and troop ships; and - pleasure yachts unless they are or will - pleasure yachts unless they are or will be crewed and carrying more than be crewed and carrying more than twelve passengers for commercial twelve passengers for commercial purposes. purposes.

-5- PE 224.972/def. (Amendment 6) Article 5 . 1. The following information shall be recorded 1. The following information shall be recorded regarding every passenger ship that departs regarding every passenger ship that departs from a located in a Member State to from a port located in a Member State if the undertake a voyage of more than twenty miles normal journey time is estimated to be at least from the point of departure: two hours or if the distance between the two ports is at least 20 miles: - the family names of the persons on - the family names of the persons on board; board; - their forenames or initials; - their forenames or initials; - their sex; - their sex; - an indication of the category of age - an indication of the category of age (adult, child or infant) to which each (adult, child or infant) to which each person belongs, or the age, or the year person belongs, or the age, or the year of birth; of birth; - when volunteered by a passenger, - when volunteered by a passenger, information concerning the need for information concerning the need for special care or assistance in emergency special care or assistance in emergency situations. situations.

2. That information shall be collected before 2. That information shall be communicated departure and communicated not later than before the passenger ship's departure to the thirty minutes after the passenger ship's company's passenger registrar or to a shore- departure to the company's passenger registrar based company system that performs the same or to a shore-based company system that function. performs the same function

(Amendment 7) Article 8, introductory sentence

Each company assuming responsibility for Each company assuming responsibility for operating a passenger ship shall, where required operating a passenger ship or an 'under sea' rail under Articles 4 and 5: tunnel shall, where required under Articles 4 and 5:

(Amendment 8) Article 9(1)

1. A Member State from whose port a 1. A Member State from whose post a passenger ship departs may lower the 20 mile passenger ship departs may lower the two hour threshold mentioned in Article 5. or 20 mile threshold mentioned in Article 5.

-6- PE 224.972/def. B. EXPLANATORY STATEMENT

Background

1. On 25th November 1996 the Commission proposed a Directive on the registration of passengers sailing on board ferries and passenger ships. This Directive requires that all passengers be registered before the vessel leaves the port, on an inventory by name, age, sex and, if relevant, disability. This would apply on journeys longer than 20 miles and forms part of safety in navigation. As expressly stated, the purposes of this Directive are the enhancement of safety and of the possibilities of rescue of passengers and crew as well as the improvement of procedures to deal with the aftermath of an accident.

2. In this context, the European Parliament welcomed the proposal as part of European Union's commitment to enhance safety by increasing the effectiveness of rescue operations linked to or after an accident. These requirements already apply to international voyages from 1st July 1997, as provided by the SOLAS Conference (Regulation III/24.2).

3. This common sense Commission proposal, responding to a request from the Council in the aftermath of the Estonia disaster, for the registration of persons sailing on board passenger ships to ensure, inter alia, the maximum capacity of the vessel is not exceeded, more effective search and rescue (SAR) operations, the rapid provision of information to families in the aftermath of an incident, was supported by the European Parliament at 1st Reading subject to a number of important amendments.

4. In addition, the Parliament proposed to include in these requirements the "under sea" tunnel with a rail journey of more than 20 miles, in order to achieve a more comprehensive application across the European Union and ensure that fair competition principles would still apply.

5. Furthermore, it underlined a serious problem which could arise if the collected information should only be communicated to the designated person or Company not later than 30 minutes after the departure of the passenger ship. Bearing in mind that the "Herald" sank in three minutes, just 22 minutes after departure from port, it is essential that the information is gathered land-side, to be available before the ship sets sail, in order to cover the event of the loss of a ship minutes from port.

6. In particular we sought to introduce some flexibility in the Directive, to highlight the lack of progress in the field of maritime safety, to extend the scope to cover the under sea le shuttle journeys, and ensure that the passenger information gathered is transmitted to shore prior to departure NOT up to 30 minutes after the ship sets sail as originally suggested by the Commission.

Common Position

7. The Common Position moves some way to accommodating our concerns and has amended to proposal for the Directive accordingly. In particular greater flexibility has been introduced including the possibility for explicit derogations in well-defined circumstances and the

-7- PE 224.972/def. clarification that each Member State has the right to decide which implementation tools best fit its internal system. The longer implementation period also allows operators to overcome any implementation problems. Perhaps of greatest significance is that the Common Position partly accepts our proposal that all information should be on shore prior to departure of the ship. The number of persons carried must now be communicated to shore prior to departure although significantly and rather curiously not the passenger registration details themselves.

8. A number of important points, however, remain to be addressed. Indeed whilst the Common Position now ensures that the number of passengers to be communicated to shore prior to departure the full passenger registrations details can remain on the ship for up to 30 minutes. This defies logic and completely undermines the proposal bearing in mind the Herald of Free Enterprise sank in three minutes. The Commission and Council are therefore requested to carefully consider whether the measure really makes any sense if this European Parliament amendment is not incorporated.

9. Perhaps the most contentious issue has been the decision by the Commission to depart from the existing SOLAS Convention, upon which this proposal is based, to specifically include the . For whilst the comprehensive application of this Directive across the European Union will ensure fair competition principles apply, this is not the case in the English Channel. Whilst SAR agencies agree that this proposal will significantly enhance safety standards across the channel the port authorities and some ferry companies believe it will seriously distort competition given the fierce competitive situation vis-à-vis the "Le Shuttle" operation in the channel tunnel.

10. An assessment has therefore to be made of both the competition and safety issues. Your Rapporteur has consulted widely, witnessed the operational situation at both and as well as on board a cross channel ferry. The Committee on Transport and Tourism has received evidence on two occasions after the serious and near fatal fire in the Channel Tunnel.

11. Eurotunnel do not register passengers and in the case of the recent fire this hindered the rescue operation during and after the fire. A point confirmed in the official report of the fire crews. The cross channel ports and ferry companies could operationally modify their procedures to implement the Directive, but not without giving the le shuttle operation a competitive advantage.

Proposals

12. Consequently in order to address the specific competition issues in the English Channel, as well as acknowledging that the same safety arguments which justify this proposal in the case of passenger ships apply equally to "Le Shuttle", the scope of the proposal should be extended to cover le shuttle.

13. This could be achieved by amending this proposal or by proposing a separate Directive for le shuttle and for both Directives to enter into force simultaneously.

-8- PE 224.972/def. 14. The Commission is currently investigating the merits of such a proposal and it is hoped that during the course of the second reading this matter can be properly assessed by both the Commission and Council.

15. Finally, whilst we acknowledge progress has been made in the field of maritime safety, particularly in the past three years, we re-affirm our view that in the period between the sinking of the Herald of Free Enterprise in 1987 (with the loss of 193 lives) and the sinking of the Estonia in 1994 (with the loss of over 900 lives) we witnessed a reluctance on the part of ship owners, operators and the regulatory authorities to learn and apply the appropriate lessons.

16. We also re-affirm our view that whilst this proposal and other recent maritime safety measures are welcome, they still fail to overcome the basic design flaws of roll on roll off passenger ships. We therefore repeat our long-standing demands for the fitting of waterlight bulkheads and sponsons.

-9- PE 224.972/def.