Consultation on the future of the UK seafarer medical examination (ENG1) fee 2022

This consultation seeks your views on removing the statutory set fee for the seafarer medical (commonly known as the ENG1) from the merchant shipping (fees) regulations 2018 (“the Regulations”) and allowing for the fee to be set by market forces. Your views are sought on:

• whether to continue with the status quo or whether to remove the ENG1 fee from the regulations which will allow approved doctors (ADs) to have the flexibility to vary the fee to reflect changing costs and recover a fee that is more comparable to the time taken for the medical (i.e. a fee uncapped by regulation).

A full list of consultation questions is contained in (section 5) of this consultation.

Responses are welcomed from 19 May 2022 to 11 August 2022. Details on how to respond are within the consultation document (section 3). The response form within (section 5) has been attached separately as a word document.

Please send your seafarer medical fees consultation response form (in Word format) to medical@mcga.gov.uk

Please send your consultation feedback form to consultation.coordinator@mcga.gov.uk

Additionally, a full impact assessment (annex A) and analytical assurance statement (annex B) have been developed and are provided as part of the package. A draft SI is at the end of the consultation document.

Where “seafarer” is mentioned with reference to medicals in this consultation, this means both merchant seafarer and fishermen.