PURPOSE: to simplify and streamline the existing EU
passenger ship safety regulatory framework (safety
standards).
PROPOSED ACT: Directive of the European Parliament and
of the Council.
ROLE OF THE EUROPEAN PARLIAMENT: Parliament decides in
accordance with the ordinary legislative procedure and on an equal
footing with the Council.
BACKGROUND : Directive
2009/45/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council aims
to attain a high level of safety and to remove barriers to trade,
by setting harmonised safety standards at an appropriate level for
passenger ships and craft operating domestic services.
This Directive has brought
about a common high safety level across the EU and important
internal market benefits.
In the spirit of the Commission's REFIT and
Better Regulation agenda and as an immediate
follow-up to the fitness
check on EU passenger ship safety legislation, the Commission
considers that the existing EU passenger ship safety regulatory
framework should be simplified and streamlined in order to (i)
maintain EU rules where necessary and proportionate; (ii) ensure
their correct implementation; and (iii) eliminate potential overlap
of obligations and inconsistencies between related pieces of
legislation.
The fitness check revealed that:
- the Directive currently applies only to 70 out of 1950
small ships, the key safety aspects of which have been already
defined by Member States;
- several Member States certify aluminium ships under
this Directive while few others do not. This creates an uneven
situation resulting from a different interpretation of the
Directive's scope related to the definition of an 'equivalent
material' and the applicability of the corresponding fire safety
standards.
The proposal is fully consistent with the
simplification proposals amending
Council Directive 98/41/EC and the proposal
replacing Council Directive 1999/35/EC
CONTENT: the Commission proposes to clarify and
simplify the safety rules and standards for passenger ships so
that they are easier to update, monitor and enforce.
The main amendments proposed are as
follows:
- to eliminate a number of redundant, inconsistent or
incorrect references, in particular
related to the Intact Stability Code, High Speed Craft Code, bow
height definition, port area (aligned with the definition of a sea
area), place of refuge (removed), port State (replacing host State
in line with the review of Directive 1999/35/EC), and recognised
organisation;
- to provide for new definitions of traditional ship, sailing ship, pleasure yacht and
craft, tender, and equivalent material. In particular, the
definition of traditional ship should be better aligned with
Directive
2002/59/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council18,
while preserving the current criteria of the year of built and type
of material. The definition of pleasure yacht and craft should be
further aligned with the International Convention for the Safety of
Life at Sea (SOLAS Convention);
- to clarify the definition of equivalent
material to avoid the non-uniform
application arising from the interpretation of the Directive's
scope related to the definition of aluminium as an equivalent
material and the applicability of the corresponding fire safety
standards. Ships built from such materials have to be certified
according to this Directive;
- to exclude ships below 24 metres from the scope of the Directive, and to clarify that
the Directive does not apply to sailing ships, tenders and ships
referred to in the SPS code (including offshore supply
vessels);
- to simplify the definitions of sea areas C and
D (references to the criteria of
'where the shipwrecked persons can land' and 'distance to place of
refuge' removed), and to clarify that the sea areas is established
by Member States in such a manner that the inner border of sea area
D is clearly delimited;
- to update the reference to the host State (replaced by
port State), to clarify that the conversion requirement is
meant to apply to all ships (when converted in a passenger ships),
not only to existing passenger ones and to insert a new date of
application for ships built in equivalent material before the entry
into force of the Directive;
- to increase transparency and to facilitate the
notification of exemptions, equivalencies and additional safety
measures by Member States, by providing for the establishment of a
database by the Commission. It should include the notified
measures in their draft and adopted form;
- to clarify that only ships fulfilling the requirements
of this Directive are provided with a Passenger ship Safety
Certificate;
- to align Directive 2009/45/EC with the provisions of
the Treaty on the Functioning of the EU with regard to the power
to adopt delegated and implementing acts conferred on the
Commission.
DELEGATED ACTS: the proposal contains provisions
empowering the Commission to adopt delegated acts in accordance
with Article 290 of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European
Union.