IN THE legalised clean-up job of the new Sea Transport Documents Bill, we have legislation by consensus, according to Andrew Robinson of the Durban-based legal firm Deneys Reitz.
Drafted by the Maritime Law Association, a balancing mechanism was found to get a fair representation of viewpoints from both the cargo owners' and shipowners' legal fraternities.
It's a good compromise bill, said Andrew Pike of Shepstone & Wylie in Durban.
And, he added, it also dusts away a lot of the doubts that have existed under the current legal situation in SA - where a combination of bits of common or case law were intertwined with the likes of the Hague Visby rules and 1850s maritime legislation from the UK, for example, and made for a bit of a messy scene.
It's now a book of regulations, clearly defined, and bringing SA legally into line with the majority of global thinking on sea transport documents - which include all types of bills of lading; sea waybills; consignment notes; and combined transport documents.
The bill - hoped to be enacted into law later this year - is similar in many respects to the English Bills of Lading Act, but SA-customised.
Main points to note, according to FTW's legal commentators, are a tightening up and clarification of the legal rights to take action by holders of an original bill of lading (titled the iron rule of maritime law), and cutting back on the escape routes for demise charterers of ships.
Currently, all of the world's main maritime nations are working with the 1952 Arrest Convention - which allows some action to be taken against demise charter ships.
But in SA, to arrest a ship you have to satisfy that you a) have a claim against the owner; and b) the ship is the wrongdoing vessel; or c) that you have a maritime lien. But we are not up-to-now a party to that Arrest Convention, and SA claimants struggled to legally clap the irons on demise charterers.
The bill, said Robinson, makes provision for the claimant to proceed against the ship and the demised charterer in one action.
The cleaning-up of the rights of the holder of the bill of lading now makes it easier for that holder to take legal action - Even, said Robinson, if he is not the owner of the goods.
By Alan Peat
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