Merchant Shipping (Safety and Load Line Conventions) Act 1932

Wireless Telegraphy.

6 Wireless telegraphy rules to implement Chapter IV of Safety Convention.

(1) The wireless telegraphy rules applicable to ships plying on international voyages shall include such requirements as appear to the Board of Trade, after consultation with the Postmaster-General, to implement the provisions of Chapter IV of the Safety Convention (except in so far as the said provisions are otherwise implemented by the Merchant Shipping Acts).

(2) The wireless telegraphy rules shall further require that the wireless telegraph installation to be provided on passenger steamers of five thousand tons gross tonnage or upwards shall (after such date not being later than two years after the commencement of this Part of this Act as may be prescribed by the rules) include a wireless direction finding apparatus as required by Article forty-seven and paragraph 17 of Article thirty-one of the Safety Convention.

7 Amendments of 9 and 10 Geo. 5. c. 38.

(1) The power of the Board of Trade, in consultation with the Postmaster-General, to make rules under subsection (2) of section one of the Merchant Shipping (Wireless Telegraphy) Act, 1919, shall include power to make rules—

(a) requiring the master of a ship to enter in the official log book such particulars relating to the operation of the wireless telegraph installation and as to the maintenance of the wireless telegraph service, as may be specified in the rules; and

(b) making provision as to the certificates to be held by, and the duties of, operators and watchers.

(2) If the master of a British ship registered in the United Kingdom fails to comply with any such requirement, or if any operator or watcher on any such ship contravenes the said rules, he shall for each offence be liable to a fine not exceeding ten pounds.

(3) The Board of Trade shall not, in pursuance of the powers conferred on them by the said Act, exempt from the obligations imposed by that Act any ship plying on international voyages, unless the exemption of the ship appears to the Board to be authorised by paragraph 2 of Article twenty-seven, or by Article twenty-eight, of the Safety Convention.

(4) For the purposes of subsection (2) of section three of the said Act the expression " passengers " shall have the same meaning as it has for the purpose of Part III of the principal Act.

8 Appointment of wireless telegraphy surveyors.

A person appointed to be a surveyor of ships under section seven hundred and twenty-four of the principal Act may be appointed as a wireless telegraphy surveyor:

Provided that the functions of the Board of Trade under the said section with respect to surveyors of ships shall not be exercised with respect to wireless telegraphy surveyors except with the approval of the Postmaster-General.

9 Survey of passenger steamers by wireless telegraphy surveyors.

(1) The surveys of a passenger steamer required by the principal Act shall, in the case of every survey made after the commencement of this Part of this Act in respect of a sea-going steamer which is not exempt under the Merchant Shipping (Wireless Telegraphy) Act, 1919, from the obligations imposed by that Act, include a survey by a wireless telegraphy surveyor, and accordingly subsection (1) of section two hundred and seventy-two of that Act shall be amended by inserting after the words " engineer surveyor of ships " the words " and, in the case of a sea-going passenger steamer required to be provided with a wireless telegraph installation, by a wireless telegraphy surveyor."

(2) The following subsection shall be inserted at the end of the said section two hundred and seventy two:—

“(5) The declaration of the wireless telegraphy surveyor shall contain statements of the following particulars, namely :—

(a) the voyages or class of voyages on which, as regards wireless telegraphy, the steamer is fit to ply;

(b) that, having regard to the tonnage of the steamer and the voyages or class of voyages on which she is declared to be fit to ply, the wireless telegraph installation complies with the wireless telegraphy rules;

(c) that the certificates of the wireless telegraphy operators and watchers are such as are required by those rules.”

(3) Section two hundred and seventy-five of the principal Act (which provides for appeals to a court of survey by persons aggrieved by the declaration of survey of a ship or engineer surveyor) shall be amended by inserting the words " or wireless telegraphy surveyor " after the words " engineer surveyor" in both places where they occur.

10 Survey of ships other than passenger steamers by wireless telegraphy surveyors.

The owner of every British ship of sixteen hundred tons gross tonnage or upwards registered in the United Kingdom, not being a passenger steamer or a ship exempt under the Merchant Shipping (Wireless Telegraphy) Act, 1919, from the obligations imposed by that Act, shall, before the ship first proceeds to sea on an international voyage from a port in the United Kingdom after the expiration of twelve months from the commencement of this Part of this Act and once in each year thereafter, cause the ship to be surveyed by a wireless telegraphy surveyor in the same manner as if she were a passenger steamer required to be provided with a wireless telegraph installation, and the provisions of sections two hundred and seventy-two, two hundred and seventy-three and two hundred and seventy-five of the principal Act shall apply accordingly.