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The rules also contain the provisions for the verification of qualifications, by the examiners, appeal from the decisions of the examiners, re-issue of the certificate in case of lost.
The Merchant Shipping (Seafarers) (Certificates of Proficiency in Survival Craft) Rules prescribe the requirements for the issue of the certificates, the qualifications for examination and the granting of the certificates.
The Merchant Shipping (Seafarers) (Conduct of Inquiries) Rules prescribe the procedures to be followed at any inquiry into the fitness or conduct of an officer, and at any re-hearing of such an inquiry. Notice of the inquiry must be served by the Seafarers' Authority on the officer concerned and the inquiry is to be held in public.
The person appointed to hear the inquiry should be assisted by one or more assessors. He is required to announce his decision in public at the end of the inquiry or as soon as possible thereafter and to make a report to the Seafarers' Authority. An assessor may sign the report with or without reservations.
The Merchant Shipping (Seafarers) (Fees) Regulation incorporates 132 fee items which are now stipulated under other pieces of Merchant Shipping legislation.
It also introduces 10 new fee items. Section 133 of the Seafarers Ordinance provides that the fee level of a service shall not be limited by reference to the costs incurred in providing that service. In setting the fee level, the Government adopted a global costing approach.
The proposed fee revisions will only affect about 40 shipping companies and around 2,000 Hong Kong foreign-going seafarers.
The extent that they will be affected should be minimal as most of the fee items in this regulation are to be revised by 10 per cent only to bring them in line with the 1995-96 price level.
The proposed fees are only adequate to recover about 22 per cent of the total cost incurred in providing the service.
The Merchant Shipping (Fees) (Amendment) Regulation 1996 provides that the fee level of a service shall not be limited to the cost incurred in providing that service.
There are altogether 21 fee items and the last revision took place on August 23, 1994 based on the global costing approach.
To revise these fee items to 1995-96 price level, an increase of 10 per cent is proposed.