8. The maximum punishment for sending or taking a ship to sea in an unseaworthy state is increased to penal servitude for ten years; and the maximum punishment for using or causing to be used in navigation any lighter or barge which is so unsafe that its use endangers human life (vide section two of the Merchant Shipping Act, 1921), is increased to imprisonment for two years with or without hard labour.

In view of the introduction into the House of Lords by the Government of the Merchant Shipping (International Labour Conventions) Bill, this Bill contains no provisions relating to the Draft Conventions adopted at Genoa and Geneva.

ARRANGEMENT OF CLAUSES.

Clause.

MASTERS AND SEAMEN.

1. Certificates of competency to be held by officers

of ships.

2. Restriction on hours of employment.

3. Scale of provisions in case of lascars, natives of India, &c.

4. Service of provisions.

5.

Certificated cooks for foreign-going ships.

6. Amendment of section 210 of the Act of 1894.

7. Amendment of section 64 of the Act of 1906.

8. Accommodation of seamen and apprentices on certain ships registered after commencement of Act.

SAFETY.

9. Loading of timber.

10. Sending or taking unseaworthy ship to sea.
11. Use in navigation of unsafe lighters, barges, &c.

Amend enactments relating, to Merchant Shipping A.D. 1924. and to make further provision with respect thereto, and for purposes connected with the matters aforesaid.

E it enacted by the King's most Excellent Majesty, by and with the advice and consent of the Lords Spiritual and Temporal, and Commons, in this present Parliament assembled, and by the authority of the same, 5 as follows:

MASTERS AND SEAMEN.

1. (1) The obligation under section ninety-two of Certificates the Act of 1894 to be provided with officers duly certi- of comcated as therein specified shall apply to the following petency to be held by 10 ships, that is to say :officers of

15

20

(a) All British home-trade passenger ships; and (b) All British ships employed in trading or going between some place or places whether within or without the United Kingdom and some place or places situate beyond the limits specified in the definition of the expression "foreigngoing ship" contained in section seven hundred and forty-two of the Act of 1894; and (c) All foreign steamships carrying passengers between places in the United Kingdom; and the provisions, including the penal provisions, of Part II. of the Act of 1894 shall extend accordingly.

(2) Subsection (1) of section ninety-two of the Act of 1894 is hereby repealed so far as inconsistent with 25 the provisions of this section.

ships.

on hours of employ

ment.

A.D. 1924. 2. (1) Except in case of grave emergency (proof whereof shall in any penal proceedings under this section Restriction rest upon the master or owner, as the case may be), no seaman or apprentice to the sea service shall be employed on or in connection with any British ship for 5 longer than eight hours a day or for longer than fortyeight hours a week, and if the master of any British vessel causes or allows any contravention of this section, he shall be liable to a fine not exceeding ten pounds, and if the owner of the vessel causes or is by any act or omisson 10 privy to the offence, he shall be liable to a fine not exceeding fifty pounds, but without prejudice to the liability of the master.

Scale of provisions in case of lascars, natives of India, &c.

Service of provisions.

(2) This section shall not apply to employment on or in connection with a fishing boat which is entered 15 in the fishing boat register.

3. Section twenty-five of the Act of 1906 shall have effect as though for subsection (5) of that section the following subsection had been substituted, namely:

"(5) In applying the foregoing provisions of 20 this section to the cases of lascars or natives of India, or to the cases of any others not accustomed to an European dietary, references to the scale contained in the First Schedule to this Act shall be construed as references to a scale of provisions 25 either prescribed by the Board of Trade or approved by the Board of Trade as adequate and suited to the needs and uses of such persons.' 4. (1) The Board of Trade may make regulations with respect to and in connection with the service of 30 the provisions required to be furnished under section twenty-five of the Act of 1906, and if the master of a ship causes or allows any contravention of or of or noncompliance with any such regulation, he shall be liable to a fine not exceeding twenty pounds, unless he shall 35 satisfy the court that there was reasonable cause for such contravention or non-compliance.

(2) The regulations for the time being in force pursuant to this section shall be and be kept conspicuously posted in two or more places in the crew's quarters, 40 and if they are not so posted and kept posted the master of the ship shall be liable to a fine not exceeding fortyshillings for every day during which the default continues.