§ Mr. Trotterasked the Minister for Trade whether he will make a statement on the recent meeting between one of his Ministers and the Norwegian Minister for Trade and Shipping.
§ Mr. SproatI visited Oslo on 17–18 June to discuss shipping policy matters with the Norwegian Minister, Mr. Arne Skauge. The discussions confirmed that the British and Norwegian Governments share common views on all the main problems of international shipping. In particular, we strongly confirmed our commitment to the maximum amount of open trade in world wide shipping, our opposition to cargo reservation as a means of protecting national merchant fleets, and to the freedom of international investment in shipping.
I also discussed with the Norwegian Minister the question of the employment of British and Norwegian offshore service vessels in the British and Norwegian sectors of the North Sea. I stressed that Norwegian offshore service ships have, and make full use of, free access to the British sector of this market, but that hardly any British, or other non-Norwegian, vessels are employed in the Norwegian sector. At the latest count there was one British supply vessel operating in the Norwegian sector, whereas there were 57 Norwegian. In the British sector, the equivalent numbers were 71 British and 47 Norwegian. I explained to the Norwegian Minister that this imbalance caused me great concern, and gave rise to understandable objections from British shipowners and seafarers that the Norwegian Government protected this market.
On this important point, I received a categoric assurance from the Norwegian Minister that there were no Norwegian protectionist laws affecting shipping and that it wa totally contrary to the policy of the Norwegian Government that there should be any protectionism in this area. The Norwegian Minister made clear that protectionism in any part of the world, whether in supply or service vessels, or in any other part of shipping, would be gravely damaging to Norway's status as a cross trader. In spite of these assurances, however, I expressed to the Norwegian Minister my fear that oil companies operating in the Norwegian sector—oil companies which are in some cases Norwegian public bodies and in other cases anxious to maintain the goodwill of the Norwegian authorities under whose licences they operate—might nevertheless feel that they were expected, outside statute, to give preference to Norwegian service vessels. We agreed that this was a practice that must be avoided. We therefore issued a joint communiqué at the end of our discussions, emphasising our two Governments' opposition to flag discrimination in this as in other shipping markets, and drawing this vital principle to the attention of oil companies operating in the North Sea as guidance in the chartering of service vessels.
Furthermore, we agreed to set up immediately a working group, composed of officials of both Governments, which would examine any differences in technical standards required by Norwegian and British regulations that might be barriers to British supply and service ships operating in the Norwegian sector of the North Sea; and that this committee should report before the end of 1982, with a view to achieving mutually acceptable standards wherever possible.
167WIn light of the assurance by the Norwegian Minister that in the field of supply and service vessels there were no protectionist laws, and that it was contrary to their policy that there should be any protectionism in practice, I hope that British supply and service ship companies will now make a renewed effort to break into the Norwegian sector market.
I shall be closely monitoring the situation over the coming months.