Merchant Shipping (Liability of Shipowners and Others) Act 1958
| Jurisdiction | UK Non-devolved |
| Citation | 1958 c. 62 |
Merchant Shipping (Liability of Shipowners and Others)Act , 1958
(6 & 7 Eliz. 2) CHAPTER 62
An Act to amend Part VIII of the Merchant Shipping Act, 1894, and section two of the Merchant Shipping (Liability of Shipowners and others) Act, 1900; and for purposes connected therewith.
Be it enacted by the Queen's most Excellent Majesty, by and with the advice and consent of the Lords Spiritual and Temporal, and Commons, in this present Parliament assembled, and by the authority of the same, as follows:—
1 Increase in liability of shipowners and others.
(1) In ascertaining the limits set to the liability of any persons by section five hundred and three of the Merchant Shipping Act, 1894 , or section two of the Merchant Shipping (Liability of Shipowners and others) Act, 1900 , there shall be substituted—
(a ) for the amount of fifteen pounds mentioned in the said section five hundred and three, an amount equivalent to three thousand one hundred gold francs;
(b ) for each of the amounts of eight pounds mentioned in the said sections, an amount equivalent to one thousand gold francs;
and the number by which the amount substituted by paragraph (a ) of this subsection is to be multiplied shall be three hundred in any case where the tonnage concerned is less than three hundred tons.
(2) For the purposes of this section a gold franc shall be taken to be a unit consisting of sixty-five and a half milligrams of gold of millesimal fineness nine hundred.
(3) The Minister of Transport and Civil Aviation may from time to time by order made by statutory instrument specify the amounts which for the purposes of this section are to be taken as equivalent to three thousand one hundred and one thousand gold francs respectively.
(4) Where money has been paid into court (or, in Scotland, consigned in court) in respect of any liability to which a limit is set as aforesaid, the ascertainment of that limit shall not be affected by a subsequent variation of the amounts specified under subsection (3) of this section unless the amount paid or consigned was less than that limit as ascertained in accordance with the order then in force under that subsection.
2 Amendments as to nature of liability limited by Merchant Shipping Act, 1894, s. 503.
(1) In subsection (1) of section five hundred and three of the Merchant Shipping Act, 1894, the following paragraphs shall be substituted for paragraphs (c ) and (d )—
‘(c ) where any loss of life or personal injury is caused to any person not carried in the ship through the act or omission of any person (whether on board the ship or not) in the navigation or management of the ship or in the loading, carriage or discharge of its cargo or in the embarkation, carriage or disembarkation of its passengers, or through any other act or omission of any person on board the ship;
(d ) where any loss or damage is caused to any property (other than any property mentioned in paragraph (b ) of this subsection) or any rights are infringed through the act or omission of any person (whether on board the ship or not) in the navigation or management of the ship, or in the loading, carriage or discharge of its cargo or in the embarkation, carriage or disembarkation of its passengers, or through any other act or omission of any person on board the ship;’
and for the words ‘loss of or damage to vessels, goods, merchandise or other things’, both where they occur in paragraph (i) and where they occur in paragraph (ii), there shall be substituted the words ‘such loss, damage or infringement as is mentioned in paragraphs (b ) and (d ) of this subsection’.
(2) For the purposes of the said subsection (1), where any obligation or liability arises—
(a ) in connection with the raising, removal or destruction of any ship which is sunk, stranded or abandoned or of anything on board such a ship, or
(b ) in respect of any damage (however caused) to harbour works, basins or navigable waterways,
the occurrence giving rise to the obligation or liability shall be treated as one of the occurrences mentioned in paragraphs (b ) and (d ) of that subsection, and the obligation or liability as a liability to damages.
(3) The application of the said section five hundred and three to any liability shall not be excluded by reason only that the occurrence giving rise to the liability was not due to the negligence of any person.
(4) Nothing in the said section five hundred and three shall apply to any liability in respect of loss of life or personal injury caused to, or loss of or damage to any property or infringement of any right of, a person who is on board or employed in connection with the ship under a contract of service with all or any of the persons whose liabilities are limited by that section, if that contract is governed by the law of any country outside the United Kingdom and that law either does not set any limit to that liability or sets a limit exceeding that set to it by that section.
(5) Paragraph (a ) of subsection (2) of this section shall not come into force until such day as the Minister of Transport and Civil Aviation may by order made by statutory instrument appoint.
(6) The Minister of Transport and Civil Aviation may by order make provision for the setting up and management of a fund, to be used for the making to harbour or conservancy authorities of payments needed to compensate them for the reduction, in accordance with paragraph (a ) of subsection (2) of this section, of amounts recoverable by them in respect of the obligations and liabilities mentioned in that paragraph, and to be maintained by contributions from such authorities raised and collected by them in respect of vessels in like manner as other sums so raised by them; any any such order may contain such incidental and supplementary provisions as appear to the Minister to be necessary or expedient.
(7) The power to make an order under subsection (6) of this section shall include power to vary or revoke any such order by a subsequent order and any such power shall be exercisable by statutory instrument, which shall be subject to annulment in pursuance of a resolution of either House of Parliament.
3 Extension to other persons of provisions applying to shipowners.
(1) The persons whose liability in connection with a ship is excluded or limited by Part VIII of the Merchant Shipping Act, 1894, shall include any charterer and any person interested in or in possession of the ship, and, in particular, any manager or operator of the ship.
(2) In relation to a claim arising from the act or omission of any person in his capacity as master or member of the crew or (otherwise than in that capacity) in the course of his employment as a servant of the owners or of any such person as is mentioned in subsection (1) of this section,—
(a ) the persons whose liability is excluded or limited as aforesaid shall also include the master, member of the crew or servant, and, in a case where the master or member of the crew is the servant of a person whose liability would not be excluded or limited apart from this paragraph, the person whose servant he is; and
(b ) the liability of the master, member of the crew or servant himself shall be excluded or limited as aforesaid notwithstanding his actual fault or privity in that capacity, except in the cases mentioned in paragraph (ii) of section five hundred and two of the said Act of 1894.
4 Unregistered ships and ships in course of completion or construction.
(1) Part VIII of the Merchant Shipping Act, 1894, shall apply to any structure, whether completed or in course of completion, launched and intended for use in navigation as a ship or part of a ship, and the expression ‘ship’ in the said Part VIII and in this Act shall be construed accordingly.
(2) The said Part VIII shall apply to any British ship notwithstanding that it has not yet been registered.
(3) The tonnage of any ship or structure to which the said Part VIII applies by virtue of this section shall, for the purposes of that Part, be ascertained as provided by subsection (2) of section five hundred and three of the said Act of 1894 with regard to foreign ships.
5 Release of ship, etc.
(1) Where a ship or other property is arrested in connection with a claim which appears to the court to be founded on a liability to which a limit is set by section five hundred and three of the Merchant Shipping Act, 1894, or security is given to prevent or obtain release from such an arrest, the court may, and in the circumstances mentioned in subsection (3) of this section shall, order the release of the ship, property or security, if the conditions specified in subsection (2) of this section are satisfied; but where the release is ordered the person on whose application it is ordered shall be deemed to have submitted to the jurisdiction of the court to adjudicate on the claim (or, in Scotland, to have prorogated that jurisdiction).
(2) The said conditions are—
(a ) that security which in the...
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