23 March 2001
The auditor general, Sir John Bourn, said in a report published this week that the Maritime and Coastguard Agency, the main government body for enforcing ship safety standards, 'needs to use a more risk-based approach for setting its UK vessel inspection targets'.
More of the MCA's inspections of small British passenger vessels should be unannounced rather than carried out as part of pre-arranged annual surveys, to increase the chance of finding serious deficiencies and unsafe operational practices.
Over half the agency's inspections are of low-risk vessels, the NAO report says. 'The agency should target more of its inspections on those foreign vessels posing the greatest safety risk,' it adds.
The MCA should do more of its inspections at remote ports and at weekends, the report stresses. 'It seldom visits some ports despite their handling of large volumes of traffic and it rarely inspects vessels at weekends,' it said.
'This gives vessel operators the opportunity of minimising the chance of their vessels being inspected.'
PFmar2001
