Minutes of the 5th Meeting of the Human Element Advisory Group (HEAG5)

							     Minutes of the 5th Meeting of the Human Element Advisory Group
                                  (HEAG5)

                                      Lloyds Register, London

                                         16 October 2007



Chairman          Andrew Craig-Bennett            COSCO Maritime (UK) Ltd.
Facilitator       John Wright                     Wrightway Training

Attendees         As attached list.


Introduction
David Turner, MCA Human Element Policy Manager, welcomed delegates to
HEAG5 for what he hoped would be an interesting and productive day.

Recalling that it was agreed at HEAG4 that chairmanship of the Group would
be shared between MCA and representatives from industry, David introduced
Andrew Craig-Bennett, Deputy General Manager of COSCO Maritime (UK)
Ltd, who had kindly volunteered to chair for the day.

Andrew welcomed delegates and gave a brief outline of his background. He
explained that we needed to address Human Element (HE) issues from first
principles. For many hundreds of years HE had been taken for granted,
indeed for much of this time all the work on board was done by manpower.
There followed a brief period, largely due to manning shortages, where HE
was taken seriously. This golden period was untypical, and the industry now
appears to have reverted to type, much to the dissatisfaction of crews from all
parts of the world. The situation had now reached a crisis to the point where
the industry was becoming unsustainable.

Andrew said that during the day there would be 3 presentations on relevant
topics, but that the principal event would be an extended workshop session.
He asked that delegates used the opportunity during workshop session to
explore the real issues that we needed to address to maintain sustainability,
how HE could play its part and how we could drive forward some of the issues
via HEAG.

Human Element – The Way Forward Using Incident Analysis
Brian Sherwood Jones

Brian gave an interesting presentation on the use of incident analysis to
improve safety performance and in particular how it could lead to identifying
areas for improvement in HE performance. We needed to learn from
accidents and incidents, and whilst the current claims trend was poor, there
were significant opportunities to make improvements if people were open to
new ideas.


Minutes of HEAG 5, 16 October 2007.
He explained that safety systems were now creeping into mainstream
management thinking and useful lessons were available from other industries.
The industry needed to reconstruct its mindset and focus more issues such
as:
     How and why did things go wrong
     Fundamentals of cause and effect in accidents
     Perceived risk models
     Development of effective systems

Bringing Marine Casualty Analysis Investigations Into The 21st Century
Peter Boyle and Tim Crowch
Peter’s and Tim’s very informative and thought provoking presentation drew
on their many years experience in the maritime and aviation industries. They
explained that many accident investigation reports were extremely thin and
did not identify the root cause of the accident. Many simply identified “human
error”, a term so wide that it was almost meaningless. Simply attributing
blame allows the same accidents to be repeated endlessly. Emphasis must
be placed on identifying the primary causes and underlying causes of
accidents and then lessons learned from these investigations must be fed into
development of systems to prevent accidents in future. In particular, they
highlighted the low level of feedback from practising seafarers as a major
problem. The presentation made many interesting comparisons between the
maritime and aviation industries, including differences in approach to accident
investigation, training, manning, feedback from crews and how society holds
different perspectives & expectations about each industry.


The Mission For Seafarers
Rev Ken Peters
Ken closed the day with a short presentation on the work of the Mission to
Seafarers. Whilst describing the work of his organisation he gave some
extremely poignant examples of help given to seafarers around the world by
The Mission and other similar organisations. A great deal of effort was put
into managing “things”, often at the expense of taking proper care of people.
He emphasised the need not only to look after the welfare of seafarers, but
also their well-being, including emotional needs, adding that loyalty works
both ways and paying effective attention to the well-being of seafarers was not
only ethical but also made good business sense.


Workshop Session
What Do We Need To Do To Keep The Shipping Industry Sustainable?
Andrew Craig-Bennett and John Wright
John introduced the session and explained that it was hoped to address a
number of key issues and challenges currently facing the industry. He
explained that the maritime industry was at a crunch point and faced many
problems, for example:

        Criminalisation of seafarers


Minutes of HEAG 5, 16 October 2007.
        Denial of shore leave
        De-motivation
        Lack of trust
        Poor commitment
        Training
        Employment
        Seafarers leaving the industry world-wide

He divided the delegates into 6 groups and challenged them to consider the
issues and propose practical solutions based on SMART 1 principles that could
realistically be taken forward by HEAG and the MCA.
1
(Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Realistic, Timebound)

Feedback From The Workshops
The groups reported back to plenary in turn and discussion followed. A
number of issues were identified by several groups, some issues only by one.
The following is a summary of the feedback based on the issues identified
rather than a group by group basis.

1.     Learning From Others
The need for effective promulgation of HE initiatives and practices to the
shipping industry was seen as an important requirement. This should include
lessons and initiatives gleaned from other industries. HEAG would be asked
to advise on the best method for promulgation.

Action
MCA to produce a discussion paper for HEAG

2.     Seafarer Involvement
It was recognised that many of the problems with safety management
systems were well known by practising seafarers but this information was not
widely available. HEAG was to be asked to give advice on how this
information could be accessed and used to maximum effect.

Action
MCA to produce a discussion paper for HEAG

Seafarers were not sufficiently involved in decision making and problem
solving processes for HE issues. HEAG was to be asked to provide advice on
how seafarers may be more effectively involved in these processes.

Action
MCA to produce a discussion paper for HEAG

3.     Working With Others
Results of P&I ship inspections indicated that ships and equipment were
largely satisfactory, yet claims continued to rise. It was thought HE issues
may form a significant contribution to this rise. P&I were considering
introducing a HE element to inspections. Consideration would be given to a
possible role for MCA/HEAG.


Minutes of HEAG 5, 16 October 2007.
Action
MCA to discuss with P&I

4.     Incident Investigation
Incident investigations that were limited to identifying the proximate cause
only were insufficient. It was essential to investigate also the environment
surrounding the activity to establish the reasons for the action taken.

5.    Regulation Making
HE considerations were generally ignored when developing regulations and
advice.

The industry was awash with regulations and more were being created all the
time. It was felt that excessive regulation confuses, overloads and de-
motivates seafarers and the plethora of regulations were not always readily
accessible.

6.    Flag State Implementation
Concern was raised over different interpretations of international regulations
and standards by flag states leading to inconsistency of implementation
across the globe. One suggestion was to abolish flag states and focus all
responsibility into a single international body, with teeth, which would be
enforced by PSC.

7.       Recruitment and Training
There was general consensus about the failure to recruit, train and retain
seafarers in adequate numbers across the industry for many years. The
modern industry appeared to be unattractive to young people, hence the age
profile of the industry was disproportionately skewed. The industry did not
appear to fully understand why people wanted to join and what it needed to do
to retain them. The lack of a clear career path with the opportunity to transfer
skills to the shore side seemed particularly problematic. Inconsistencies in
training were also raised, one possible solution identified being to remove
responsibility for training away from companies to a central body.

8.     Cultural and Legal Issues
Many groups identified the prevalence of a blame culture as a serious
problem, both within companies and with Administrations. It was easier to
prosecute an individual than a company with the continued criminalisation of
seafarers contributing to a poor image and self esteem within the industry.
We needed to move away from a blame culture towards one of learning and
continued training, where good behaviour was rewarded rather than
constantly focussing on bad behaviour.

Poor performing companies were still thriving within the industry. It was
claimed that some charterers were only interested in the freight rate, not the
condition of the ship or the crew’s welfare. One possible solution suggested
was the option to exclude poor performing companies, or even poor
performing flags.


Minutes of HEAG 5, 16 October 2007.
It was thought that commercial pressures and competition between Flags,
Class and P&I were having a detrimental effect on safety.

It was recognised that a number of Flags were in the pay of companies and
the ability to move issues forward via IMO were restricted.

9.      Accidents and Incidents
More transparency was required in identifying accident and incident statistics
analogous with aviation. It was important to share and use this information
effectively if we were to make the necessary improvements in safety
performance. It was suggested safety performance information could be
recorded in Equasis.




Marc Wiliams
Human Element Development Manager
Human Element Team
Maritime and Coastguard Agency
Bay 2/18
Spring Place
105 Commercial Road
Southampton
SO15 1EG

Tel. 02380 329358
Fax. 02380 329371
Email human.element@mcga.gov.uk

December 2007.




Minutes of HEAG 5, 16 October 2007.
Delegates to HEAG 5

Chair
Andrew Craig-Bennett

Facilitator
John Wright

MCA
 David Turner
 Doug Patterson
 Edmund Hughes
 Marc Williams
 Sally Puntis

Industry Delegates
 Colin Brookman
 Christine Tomlinson
 Rodger MacDonald
 Marc Lassagne
 Richard Vie
 Julia Pearce
 Hunter Smith
 Dr Phillip Anderson
 Sam Carsten Aase
 Andrew Mitchell
 Jan Fransen
 Paul Leach
 Paul Shanahan
 Dik Gregory
 Rob Miles
 John Mace
 Tim Lowry
 Michael Grey
 Andrew Sillitoe
 Ian Barr
 David Wheal
 Mike Rudd
 Rev Canon Ken Peters
 Alan Graveson
 Nigel Cooper
 Brian Sherwood Jones
 Tim Crowch
 Peter Boyle
 Mans Jacobsson
 John Newton
  R Malcolm




Minutes of HEAG 5, 16 October 2007.