Member News
By Viscount Younger of Leckie - 3rd November 2011
Viscount Younger of Leckie calls for an effective replacement for the Emergency Towing Vessels to ensure they retain their important role in safeguarding British coasts.
The government has announced that the four Emergency Towing Vessels (ETVs), on standby off the UK coastline for major incidents such as tanker disasters, will be withdrawn in 2011. The objective is to save £32m over a four-and-a-half year period. The reason cited is that the ETVs must be on 30-minute cast-off notice and therefore can have no parallel use; in effect they are waiting, necessarily unused, for a major incident that we all hope will never occur again.
Despite the cost, I argue that ETVs remain critical in the event that a major vessel runs aground, spilling its cargo which could include oil or chemicals. We all recall the foundering of the MV Braer which ran aground off the Shetland Islands spilling over 100,000 tonnes of North Sea crude oil. This disaster prompted the 1994 Donaldson report which recommended the introduction of the ETVs. The Sea Empress disaster in 1996, spilling 73,000 tonnes of crude oil, took five years to clear up at a cost of £60m, far outweighing the cost of keeping the ETVs.
Future responsibility for the management of major incidents requiring strong tug pull will be passed to the commercial owners of the ships in distress who will be left to negotiate with the salvage operator. This is a return to the pre-Donaldson status quo, with the real inherent risks of unclear or convoluted ownership, and therefore lack of responsibility, potentially leaving ships to further spill their cargo unchecked. Further, it is a reckless decision in the event that another nuclear submarine runs aground, as HMS Astute did in full public gaze in 2010. Other tugs, which are smaller and which are not on 30-minutes standby, come nowhere near possessing the 'bollard pull' to effect rescues.
Scotland is seeking a long-term replacement for the ETVs and consequently the government has given interim funding there to support the extended service for three months, confined to the Western Isles and Northern Ireland. The Scottish Office will announce the findings of a working group by the end of 2011. In the meantime the rest of the British Isles has no such support and remains vulnerable to a major offshore environmental and economic disaster.
At present there is no alternative to the ETVs. Without a credible replacement they remain our best insurance against the untold long-term damage that could occur in the event of another disaster waiting to happen in our busy shipping lanes.
James Younger is a former recruitment consultant and is a hereditary peer. He sits on the Conservative benches.
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