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- Title
"Purely a Question of Policy:" Undermanning and the Late Victorian Merchant Marine.
- Authors
Gorski, Richard
- Abstract
This paper addresses undermanning in the British merchant marine in the second half of the nineteenth century, with particular reference to the loss of Port Yarrow in 1894 and the public committee established in its wake which reported back in 1896. This committee was chaired by Sir Edward Reed. He and his colleagues had the extremely difficult, and ultimately insuperable, task of isolating issues stemming from the quantity of crew carried aboard merchant vessels from issues that were concerned with their quality. Shipowners' representatives fought a successful rearguard action against intrusive recommendations to fix manning scales to gross registered tonnage. Board of Trade officials were highly sceptical that such fixed manning scales could be introduced, but in the end they were left to implement the much vaguer compromise enacted as the Undermanning Act of 1897. The result was a weak piece of legislation that satisfied very few of the interested parties. Undermanning has been neglected as a facet of safety at sea and legal definitions of seaworthiness. This paper outlines the arguments for and against intervention, and the extent to which the British "Shipping Interest" fragmented into groups that pursued their own objectives. The role of the Board of Trade's Marine Department is also stressed -- the attitudes of its senior staff, its contributions to policy development and its function as an enabler of consultation and negotiation. Undermanning, then, is here considered as a test of the state's willingness to interfere in the shipping industry in the 1890s.
- Subjects
UNITED Kingdom; MERCHANT marine -- Manning of vessels; MERCHANT marine; GREAT Britain. Board of Trade; REED, Edward; MARITIME law
- Publication
International Journal of Maritime History, 2007, Vol 19, Issue 1, p1
- ISSN
0843-8714
- Publication type
Article
- DOI
10.1177/084387140701900103