PROTECTION OF WRECKS BILL (Hansard, 28 June 1973)

§ THE EARL OF CORK AND ORRERY
My Lords, I beg to move that this Report be now received.

§ LORD SHEPHERD
My Lords, I beg to move Amendment No. 1 on behalf of my noble friend Lord Kennet and the noble Earl, Lord Cork and Orrery. I do not think one needs to deploy an argument in support of this amendment. It was done fully on Committee, and I understand that the Government undertook to look at the provisions of the 2174 Amendment and to see whether they could give certain assurances that my noble friend and the noble Earl required. I beg to move the Amendment, to give the benefit to the Government.

EARL FERRERS
My Lords, I am grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Shepherd, for moving this Amendment on behalf of his noble friend Lord Kennet. I know that the noble Lord, Lord Kennet, was concerned that there should be some specific obligation put upon either the customs officers, the Customs Service or the Coastguard Service to take account of the areas which will become designated areas from the moment the information is given that they will become designated areas until the time when they are in fact designated. I think I can give the noble Lord, Lord Shepherd, the assurances that he requires. I hope that he will not press this Amendment, because we believe that it would be better if the assurances which he seeks are not written into the Bill. It is likely that the news of the intention to designate a site in a particular area will attract pretty constant attention to the site from coastguards as well as from others, and we also have offers of active help from voluntary sources which may prove of considerable use in the areas concerned.
I cannot agree that the Customs Service or the coastguards will be given specific and explicit responsibilities for the protection of these areas. The coastguards and Receiver of Wrecks, the Customs Service and the police will be asked to do all that they can within the normal course of their duties to ensure that no unauthorised persons interfere with these designated sites. In practice, where there is a proposal for a designated area in a coastguard's area the coastguard will be informed and will obviously take an interest in any activities which occur within that area. Furthermore, if there is a serious risk of interference with the site between the time 2175 when it is proposed to designate and the actual order of designation, the Secretary of State has powers to make immediate designation orders.
My Lords, I accept the argument of the noble Lord, Lord Kennet, that this is a weak part of the Bill. I accept his desire that specific responsibility should be given to some people but I hope that the noble Lord, Lord Shepherd, will recognise that we take his noble friend's point. I hope that he will realise that we believe that there will be adequate interest and adequate protection from the people to whom I have referred and also from private interests, and I hope he will also realise that if there is any real danger of this area being looted, the Secretary of State has power to make an immediate designation order. My Lords, I hope that with those assurances the noble Lord, Lord Shepherd, will not wish to place a specific responsibility on either the customs officers or the coastguards to undertake this protection.

§ THE EARL OF CORK AND ORRERY
My Lords, I for one accept the reasonableness of what my noble friend has said in reply to the Amendment. I have slight misgivings, I must confess, because it seems to me, as my noble friend himself has said, that this is a weakness in the Bill. Once a wreck has been discovered and is likely to be designated as a restricted area, the fact has to be so widely advertised that every person who might choose to descend upon it and loot it will be alerted and there is some risk that the Bill itself may be self-defeating. I will not go so far as to say that the Bill as it stands, without the Amendment, would be worse than no Bill at all; but I am not at all sure that it could not turn out to be like that. But I do take the point that the Secretary of State is enabled and empowered in an emergency—if something which could be described as an emergency should arise—immediately to clap on a restriction order. I suspect that there is also a possibility that by the time the emergency may have presented itself to him with sufficient force it may be too late. However, I appreciate that the Government are seized with the significance of this Amendment and I daresay that the noble Lord, Lord Shepherd, will not press it; and I will not do so either.

§ LORD SHEPHERD
My Lords, the noble Earl, and also the noble Earl on the Front Bench opposite, recognises the weakness in this Bill. Like the noble Earl, I do not feel that the assurances which the noble Earl has given go very far except, of course, that in the end it seems to me, from what the noble Earl has said, that it could be considered the responsibility of the Secretary of State to impose an order immediately where there is reason to believe that a wreck, before it has been designated, is liable to be looted. My Lords, I do not think that this is an occasion for pursuing this matter. I think my noble friend Lord Kennet will read with interest what the noble Earl has said and if necessary will come back at a later stage in the Bill. I beg leave to withdraw the Amendment.