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be granted to experienced seamen on the basis of foreign certificates held, previous training and experience, and an interview by Department of Trade surveyors to assess their ability in spoken English and technical competence.
40 The visiting team concluded that it would be most unsatisfactory to rely on an interview alone for the granting of Hong Kong certificates under the transitional arrangements, Instead, we now envisage special examinations being held calling for less theoretical knowledge, but more practical experience, than normal Department of Trade examinations and requiring an overall performance broadly comparable to that expected of a successful candidate in our examinations. These arrangements would last for eight years, during which time Hong Kong would be expected to develop its entry and training arrangements on lines equivalent to ours. We have told the Governor of these conclusions but have not, so far, received any reaction. He is probably regarding them as in abeyance pending confirmation by the new Government.
Safety Equipment and Materials
5. Almost without exception, Hong Kong shipowners have their ships built in Japanese yards and have them fitted out with Japanese equipment. However, ships at present built in Japanese shipyards for UK owners contain mainly British safety equipment because little Japanese equipment has been submitted for approval by this Department for incorporation in ships built for the UK register. The items involved are for example lifeboats, life- jackets and navigation lanterns and exports to Japan for this purpose are worth about £300,000 a year at present. The Hong Kong owners would like to see sone acceleration of the present arrange- ments for approval of Japanese equipment for incorporation in ships destined for a Hong Kong register,
6. The team looked at this very carefully. We are convinced that standards in respect of safety equipment, materials, instellations and survey should be the same for the Hong Kong and UK Registers. The team found that excellent testing facilities are available in Japan and that the Japanese are prepared to test to our standards. The testing could be facilitated by our stationing a Department of Trade surveyor at the British Embassy in Japan to approve equipment and also to do plan approvals, surveys and resurveys for UK ships building in Japan. A Department of Trade surveyor would also be able to bring the merits of British equipment to the attention of the Japanese and he could spot export opportunities for British firms; the total of UK marine equipment exports to Japan. including navigational equipment, radar and steering gear is running at about £7 million a year and is increasing.
7.
Nevertheless, such an arrangement would provide some commercial advantages to the Japanese in that once their equipment was approved it could be sold for incorporation in
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No comments yet.
Private notes are available after approval.