Calmac Ferries Limited Minutes of Board Meeting
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Minutes 1 of 7 CALMAC FERRIES LIMITED MINUTES OF BOARD MEETING HELD IN THE BOARDROOM, AT THE FERRY TERMINAL, GOUROCK, ON WEDNESDAY 19 SEPTEMBER 2012 ____________________________________________________________________________________ Present Mr P K Timms, Chairman Mr L B MacLeod Mr N L Quirk Mr M Dorchester Mr R L Drummond Mr G A Taylor In attendance: Mr I Gillies Mrs W Allardes, Managing Director, David MacBrayne HR (UK) Ltd Mr D Cannon, Group Public Affairs Manager, David MacBrayne Ltd Mr B Fulton, Head of Operations Mr C Paterson, Board Administrator ____________________________________________________________________________________ 1. PRELIMINARIES Mr Timms welcomed Mr Gillies, Mrs Allardes, Mr Cannon and Mr Fulton to the meeting. 1.1 Apologies for absence Apologies were given on behalf of Ms P J D Stark. Mr Taylor would be attending the meeting shortly having been unavoidably delayed. 1.2 Declarations of interest Mr MacLeod declared that he was a Board Member of Stòras Uibhist, in regard to any matters relating to the Mallaig / Lochboisdale route. There were no further declarations of interest, other than those previously made and known to all Directors. 1.3 Safety Review General Report, Action Plan and Audits (p1-7) Mr Dorchester indicated that he would comment on the significant aspects of the report rather than going through it in detail. Mr Timms observed that the quality of the report had much improved and that this was very welcome. Mr Dorchester responded that it gave more opportunity to discuss operational incidents. Mr Dorchester noted that there had not been any serious safety issues and no enforcement orders had been issued against the Company. He was pleased to note that Food Safety Inspections had not raised any serious concerns and improvements had been found in all vessels inspected. He also highlighted that four vessels had had their Safety Management Certificates renewed after MCA Audit, with the MCA particularly noting the standards on board the Mv Coruisk as having been the best so far. Mr Dorchester noted that although there had appeared to have been an increase in passenger incidents, no discernible causation pattern was evident. Commenting on the Near Miss statistics he was not clear on whether the increased numbers was due to better reporting or another reason. Mr MacLeod indicated that the Group Safety Committee would carry out a careful analysis of the data. In respect of Safety Alerts, the Board enquired if they were all issued in response to incidents. Mr Dorchester responded that in some cases they were issued as the result of an incident, but that others were issued in recognition of industry concerns raised. CalMac Ferries/Board/19 September 2012 Minutes 2 of 7 Raising the matter of Car Deck Operations, referred to in previous meetings, Mr Dorchester noted that the rolling programme of training was continuing. Mr MacLeod added that the Group Safety Committee would ensure that the progress rate of the programme was increased. Bringing his comments to a close, Mr Dorchester noted that he would be meeting with Mr W Robertson to discuss how improvements could be made to trend reporting, which would include the examination of what software could assist. Mr Taylor joined the meeting. 2. MINUTES/MATTERS ARISING 2.1 Minutes of previous meeting The Minutes of the Board Meeting held on 16 May 2012 were approved. 2.2 Matters arising There were no matters to record. 3. CHAIRMAN’S REMARKS 3.1 Chairman’s Remarks Mr Timms noted that Mr Dorchester had met the previous day with the Minister for Transport and Veterans, Keith Brown, MSP. Also attending was Richard Hadfield, Head of Ferry Operations, and a new appointee to Transport Scotland, Mr John Nicholls, Director, Ferries Division. The Minister had had a number of key points which he wished to discuss. a) The delay by the Company in issuing the Winter Timetable; Mr Dorchester had noted that the revised fares levels were not approved by Scottish Ministers until September and it was a long and laborious manual process to input these changes into the Company’s ticketing systems: alterations to RET rates also had contributed to the delay. Mr Dorchester had undertaken to consider possible systems improvements b) The proposed additional spend of £1.5M on vessel winter refits; Mr Dorchester had agreed to re-examine the proposal. He noted that it would be important to explain such proposals to Transport Scotland in order that they could fully brief the Minister. [FOISA Status - Exemption under Section 30 (Prejudice to Effective Conduct of Public Affairs)] The Board discussed further examples relating to the points raised. Mr Timms noted that he would be having a meeting with the Minister on 27 September 2012. The Board continued with a lengthy discussion on improving communications and providing better briefings to Transport Scotland and the Minister. In respect of the appointment of the succeeding Chairman and Non-Executive Directors Mr Timms noted that an announcement would not be made until the end of the month, at the earliest. CalMac Ferries/Board/19 September 2012 Minutes 3 of 7 4. APPROVALS/POLICY ISSUES 4.1 Approval of Managing Director as Bank Account Signatory (p8) The Board approved the Managing Director as a Signatory for the Company’s Special Interest Bank Account. 5. OPERATIONAL PERFORMANCE REVIEW AND FORWARD LOOK 5.1 Managing Director’s report (p9-50) Mr Dorchester noted the improvement to Costs Analysis reporting provided by Mr Drummond and his Finance Team and indicated that it was very helpful to the Operations Department. He made some general observations on the carryings, noting that where RET was being introduced to new routes, and that community engagement, in tandem with Transport Scotland, would be required. The Board asked if there had been any recent discussions on fuel hedging. Mr Drummond responded that while the subject had not been examined, it was perhaps worth re- introducing dialogue with the Scottish Government. The Board further asked if the Mv Clansman retail revenue increase could be explained when measured against other fleet vessels. Mr Dorchester noted that he was already looking into the matter. Mr Dorchester invited Mr Taylor to present the Technical Report. Technical Update (p21-24) Fleet Reliability Mr Taylor noted that the data on Fleet Reliability was continually being refined. The Board examined the trends and a short discussion took place. Mr Taylor referred in particular to the 25 % pistons failures on the Mv Isle of Lewis, noting that how they failed is known, but not why. Indicating that there appeared to be fuel related failures on the Mv Clansman and Mv Hebrides, he explained that he was going the fuel supplier’s Dundee refinery to conduct a Supply Audit. Mr Timms noted that there was a very complex hydrocarbon structure to fuels from alternative sources and because different engines were being operated on different hours, it was very difficult to identify a common factor. Normal fuel pitting damage to pistons would occur on the upper surface of pistons, but this damage was being discovered on the underside of them. Mr Taylor added that two very recent failures not in the report had involved the Mv Bute taking a rope into its aft Schottel unit, and the subsequent damage to the clutch pack requiring Belgian Service engineers to attend, and Mv Coruisk had sustained a piston problem which had been repaired overnight, with the vessel returning to service this morning. Human Resources Update (p25-33) [FOISA Status - Exemption under Section 30 (Prejudice to Effective Conduct of Public Affairs)] Crewing project Mrs Allardes noted that although Call-back rates are declining there is still opportunity to increase further reductions. Various options were under review to continue with progress. Head of Operations Report (p34-45) Mr Fulton took the Board through the Performance and Carryings statistics, as well as the Customer Care results. In regard to Customer Care, one complaint focussed on the CalMac Ferries/Board/19 September 2012 Minutes 4 of 7 provision of toilet facilities on board the Mv Loch Dunvegan. Mr Taylor agreed to have a review on what improvements could be introduced. Action 1: Mr Taylor Another Customer complaint related to the effort required to get toilet entrance doors opened as they quite often provided difficulty for young or elderly passengers. While noting that toilets required Fire Doors which were heavier than normal doors, Mr Taylor agreed to instruct vessels to check toilet door operations and adjust the door closing mechanisms where appropriate. Action 2: Mr Taylor Head of Commercial Development report (p46-49) Mr Dorchester introduced Mr Collier’s report. Key Stakeholder Relationships (p46) Mr Dorchester noted that interaction with VisitScotland had been significantly increased. He added that Mr Collier was preparing a paper for the David MacBrayne Board which would bring all strands of Commercial Development together. Mr Dorchester also noted that it was important that the Company invested time in improving links with other significant tourism bodies. PR report (p50) Mr Dorchester introduced Mr Cannon’s report. CFL Media issues He noted that in regard to item 1, offering a detailed response still does not appear to satisfy complainants. In regard to item 10, it was noted that the Argyll Ferries operation was the current single biggest issue and very draining on management time and resources. The Board noted the Managing Director’s Report. 5.2 Performance Report (p51) Mr Dorchester presented the report. Noting that some cancellations and delays had attracted penalties and some attracted relief, he suggested that a 97.8% reliability level demonstrated a fairly solid transport operation. In total there had been 70 reliability failures out of 102,000 sailings, which was a very favourable industry record.