§ Mr. McNamaraasked the Secretary of State for Trade (1) whether he will list in the Official Report the number of statutory preliminary inquiries and statutory formal inquiries held by his Department into the loss of life, vessels or collisons or other maritime incidents in the past 10 years, indicating (a) the date and nature of the incident (b) the date and time taken to hold the preliminary inquiry (c) the date and time taken for the formal inquiry, and (d) the date of the publication of the report of the inquiry and the time between the incident and the report;
(2) in respect of statutory preliminary inquiries and statutory formal inquiries held by his Department into the loss of life, vessels or collisions or other maritime incidents in the past 10 years, what were the nature of any recommendations made by the inquiry and the steps taken by his Department to implement the recommendations by statutory notice, departmental marine notice, legislation or otherwise;
(3) what is the average time, following a marine casualty, for the holding 373W of the preliminary inquiry to the report of the findings of the formal inquiry.
§ Mr. ShoreThis information covering the past 10 years is not readily available and could not be obtained in the detail required without disproportionate effort. However, experience over the past five years shows that the average time between a casualty and the submission of a preliminary inquiry report was four months and that an average of a further 12 months elapsed between the preliminary inquiry report and the commencement of the formal investigation. Since January 1973, however, when two extra wreck commissioners were appointed, the latter period has fallen to 5½ months. The findings of preliminary inquiries and formal investigations have a significant
Year 1964 1965 1966 1967 1968 1969 1970 1971 1972 1973 Merchant Ship Crews 103 82 140 107 58 61 74 49 110 71 Passengers … … 8 13 7 7 6 4 1 3 4 4 Fishing Vessels … 26 44 31 16 80 28 22 22 22 23