The merchant shipping (safety standards for passenger ships on domestic voyages) (miscellaneous amendment) regulations 2020

Since 2015, the European Commission has reviewed numerous items of EU legislation under its Regulatory Fitness and Performance (REFIT) programme. This supports better regulation agenda and aims to ensure that regulations deliver their intended benefits for citizens, businesses and society while removing red tape and lowering costs. It also aims to make regulations simpler and easier to understand.

The result of the REFIT exercise being carried on Directive 2009/45/EC on safety rules and standards for passenger ships is amending directive (EU) 2017/2108. Directive 2009/45 applies only to seagoing domestic passenger ships.

These are ships that:-

• carry more than 12 passengers;
• go to sea; but,
• only undertake non-international voyages, back to the same port, or to a different port, within the same EU Member State.

These amendments in directive 2017/2108 comprise mainly updates, clarifications and improvements to layout. There is however one important, substantive change to the technical safety requirements; the removal of ships below 24m length from scope of the directive. As the requirements in (the substantive) directive 2009/45 are underpinned by UK legislation (SI 2000/2687), intervention is necessary to transpose directive 2017/2108 so that this amendment can be reflected, and any benefits that it represents made available to UK industry.