Flying the flag

By Julian Bray

Wednesday 19 March 2008

A YEAR on from the relaunch of the Red Ensign as the UK Ship Register and those in charge are claiming some modest success.

Amid much wailing and gnashing of teeth recently over the impact on London of the imposition of tax on non-domiciled individuals for the first time, the UK Ship Register has brought some welcome news with continued growth.

At the register’s annual reception this week at the Chamber of Shipping, Transport Minister Jim Fitzpatrick said the flag has hit a new record for recent times of 14.2m tonnes — with 47 more ships joining the register over the past year.

Building on the near decade long success of the tonnage tax scheme, Mr Fitzpatrick now also credits the growth with the new “customer orientated” approach of the flag, getting away from perceived past bureaucratic burdens.

Warnings over the impact on shipping safety of such changes have been made over the past year from respected figures in the labour movement, an issue Mr Fitzpatrick clearly wanted to address. Five vessels were refused registration in the past year, while the average age of those leaving the flag had been 19 years and those joining eight.

Peter Cardy, who as head of the Maritime and Coastguard Agency has to run the flag, admitted the agency’s current labour dispute was “a little local difficulty”, although it had not compromised its ability to do its job.

The Chamber of Shipping director general was also guardedly positive as he noted there were “some indications” that Brussels was taking a more pragmatic stance on key tax and employment issues.

Despite the gloom in some quarters of London’s maritime community over the impact of the new non-dom tax rules and global bank credit crisis, at least there remains room for optimism about Britain’s own shipping industry.

The award of the Officer Trainee of the Year to Jenny Hibbert also showed that a new generation has something to give the industry.

The last decade has seen not only a revival in the numbers of ships and companies using the UK flag, but also a long overdue remodelling the Red Ensign as a modern, internationally competitive flag. Safety and quality must be maintained, but safety and quality would mean little if the fleet all flew foreign flags.

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