---

MSC Napoli

I am grateful to the Minister for allowing me to see an advance copy of his statement. He has taken a close personal interest in this matter from the beginning. I also pay tribute to my hon. Friend the Member for East Devon (Mr. Swire) whose commitment as the constituency MP has been exemplary. The House should congratulate the French authorities, SOSREP, the Maritime and Coastguard Agency and the Environment Agency, and, above all, the men and women of royal naval squadron 771, who bravely took on mountainous waves and gale force winds to save the 26 crew members. The rescue exemplified the highest standards of the Royal Navy. It was executed amid waves higher than the helicopter itself. When we see press reports stating that the men and women involved may be given a bravery award, I want to ask the Minister whether he really believes that such courage and commitment should be rewarded by handing over Britain’s elite RAF and royal naval search and rescue operations to a private finance initiative, with uniformed people just embedded in it. Moving on to the vessel itself, once the marine accident investigation branch has finished its inquiry, we will need to know how it was that a ship given a clean bill of health in Antwerp only five days before, almost cracked down the middle off the coast of Devon. Indeed, it appears that there have been concerns about this vessel since it ran aground on a reef in the Malacca straits six years ago. Had the Napoli been out in the Atlantic when her sides cracked open, the main story might not have been the looters at the bay, but the tragic death of 26 seafarers. Yet this was a British registered vessel. It was our duty as the flag state to make sure she was seaworthy. The inquiry must answer questions about that. Can the Minister also reassure the House that the British coastguard carries out sufficient port state control inspections of foreign flagged vessels visiting UK ports, as is our duty under the Paris memorandum of understanding? Do we know yet whether there is evidence to suggest that human error played any part in the accident? Last year, Steve Allum of Aon Global Marine—one of the world’s specialists in marine risk—warned that, due to the employment of under-trained but considerably cheaper crews,"““the possibility of human error is significantly higher and will inevitably lead to increased accidents””." A ship crewed by people from eastern Europe, the Philippines, Turkey and India must surely have suffered from language problems and possibly training problems, too. Will that be investigated? Although the beaching of the vessel at the world heritage site of Lyme bay caused understandable and widespread concern—indeed, dismay—this was, as the Minister says, the only feasible place to shelter the boat. The worst outcome would have been for the vessel to have sunk in the open sea. In its fragile state, had it been towed away, it would have had to face the gale side on and would almost certainly have broken up—with horrendous environmental consequences. Nevertheless, the ship has offloaded significant hazards into the sea. Will the Minister say something about containers that may still be floating at sea? It is good to hear that most of the rest of the fuel will be cleared by Sunday, but is there an estimate of the extent of the residue? Mercifully, we have heard reports of only 1,500 oiled birds and 600 corpses so far. That is modest in view of the potential scale of the damage. I salute the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds and the RSPCA for their efforts. Has the Minister commissioned an environmental impact assessment on the marine environment, especially the Lyme bay coral reefs and bird life? May I urge, as my hon. Friend the Member for East Devon did before, revisiting our ancient salvage laws? Surely earlier action could have been taken against the unacceptable looting, which rightly caused so much public disgust. I end where I began in congratulating the Royal Navy and all the various agencies, French as well as British, on a magnificent rescue and a successful damage limitation and clean-up operation.