A number of scenarios have been raised here such as certificates not available for inspection, expired certificates, certificates of other flag States without ship's flag State endorsement, and STCW 78 certificates.

　

The requirements are quite clear - all officers must have, available for inspection, a valid and original STCW 95 certificate of competency - there are no exceptions. Recognition, or endorsement of a certificate by the ship's flag State is a separate issue that I will deal with later. The nationality of the seafarer and the certificate held by the seafarer are not related - in other words it is not necessary for a Canadian seafarer, for example, to hold a Canadian certificate of competency as long as he holds a certificate issued by a Party to the Convention. It must always be remembered that the holding of a certificate does not on its own entitle a seafarer to sail on a ship without an endorsement or certificate of recognition issued by the flag State of the ship, unless of course the original certificate was issued by the flag State of the ship and then no endorsement or recognition is required.

　

　

Recognition of certificates is another area that creates quite a deal of confusion, most of it unnecessary if we remember the basics. All officers, unless the officer holds a certificate of competency issued by the flag State of the ship he is serving on, must hold an individual certificate of recognition or have an endorsement from the flag State of the ship allowing the officer to sail on ships of that flag State. The only exception to this is if the officer can produce documentary evidence that an application has been submitted to the flag State administration for an endorsement - this documentary evidence is valid for a maximum period of three months. The foregoing is quite a simple requirement and port State control officers should not be distracted by superfluous matters such as no agreement being in place between administrations, blanket letters allowing any certificate holder to sail on the ship, holders of flag State certificates also holding certificates of recognition and seafarers not being aware that a certificate of recognition was on board the ship in their name.

　

Ratings do not require endorsements either by the Party issuing the certificate or by the administration of the ship on which the rating is serving. However, all rating's certificates are required to be valid and suited to the duties to be performed by the holder. A statement that the certificate met the requirements of regulation II or III of the Convention would normally evidence this.

　

　

No port State control officer can be expected to know what action to take in all circumstances nor is it reasonable to expect them to have an extremely detailed knowledge of every requirement of the Convention. It is therefore very important to ensure that they have a good grounding in the basic requirements of the Convention and are able to access immediate advice and assistance.

　

If possible port State control inspectors should be given a briefing on the basic reason behind the revised Convention and the safety critical issues that would require a detention.

　

For example a certificate of competency that had the wrong regulation stated on the certificate for the rank it supposedly qualified the holder for, may only be a typographical error from a careless administration or it may indicate a fraudulent certificate. Therefore the port State control officer should detain the ship until the matter is resolved. It may be that the flag State of the ship advise that they accept the certificate and have issued a certificate of recognition however an independent check finds the certificate to be fraudulent - then regardless of flag State recognition, the ship must be detained until a properly certificated officer is on board. (There will of course always be different circumstances in cases like this where it may be quite safe to allow the ship to proceed to the next port short handed, or some other solution which will not create a patently unsafe situation.)

　

Another situation that can create problems is that of an officer being on board without a certificate of recognition or endorsement from the flag State of the ship. This may seem to be a trivial matter as the officer apparently holds a valid certificate of competency - so what is the real problem? The number one problem is that it is not in compliance with the Convention - you may say, and quite reasonably so, that to make a fuss about an apparently minor matter would be overly bureaucratic.

　

Let us look at this situation very carefully - it is quite clear that the ship is not complying with the requirements of the Convention and it is a detainable offence. One of the reasons that the 78 Convention failed was lack of strict compliance by Parties and not to take the most stringent action in cases of non-compliance would be weakening the 95 Convention. Further to this there could be many reasons why the officer concerned did not have the required endorsement and one of them could be that his certificate is fraudulent. Remember that the requirements of the 95 Convention were very carefully thought out and are the minimum standard that is to be met internationally - any slight relaxation in policing these standards will start us off on the slippery slope of allowing the 95 Convention to meet the same fate as its predecessor - failure.

　

I am fully aware that a ship may be detained for a qualifications related issue and within a matter of a few hours a fax from the flag State will allow the ship to be released even though the port State is not fully satisfied that the spirit of the Convention has been met. In the long run, the fact that a detention has been recorded will keep pressure on the poorer flag States and shipowners, and this is one of the ways that we can eventually raise standards internationally.