MPs highlight ship-breaking environment threat
The House of Commons’ Environment, Food and Rural Affairs Select Committee has warned that British ships are being dismantled in highly dangerous conditions in developing countries.
In its latest report, published today, the Committee suggests that standards of health, safety and environmental protection at ship breaking yards in countries including India, Pakistan and Bangladesh are “wholly inadequate”.
Many of the vessels, moreover, contain hazardous materials, including asbestos, PCBs and waste oils.
The report calls for urgent action from the Government to address this unsafe activity. The matter is particularly pressing because of an international agreement requiring all remaining single-hulled tankers to be dismantled by 2015 – with the oldest scheduled for destruction in 2005.
Calling on Ministers to press the International Maritime Organisation for a binding agreement on standards in ship dismantling, the Committee is urging the Government to take advantage of 2005’s UK presidency of the European Union and the G8.
The problem of environmental standards in ship-breaking first came to prominence in March 2004, when a fleet of US “ghost ships” were refused permission to be dismantled in Hartlepool, following a court case brought by Friends of the Earth.
Greenpeace campaigner Mark Strutt welcomed the Committee’s proposals, declaring, “They should support the development of purpose designed, state of the art ship recycling facilities in the UK and put pressure on commercial ship owners to cease sending ships contaminated with hazardous materials like asbestos, PCB and waste oils to developing countries.”
In the report, the Committee also encourages to the Government to help promote the development of a domestic ship-breaking industry.
Responding to the report, Environment Minister Elliot Morley stated, “I am in full agreement that ship dismantling must be undertaken in an environmentally and humanly sound manner and that urgent progress is needed at the international level to develop a solution.
“Government is actively engaged in international discussions on ship recycling.
“At home work is underway on the development of a UK Ship Recycling Strategy and the issues and recommendations raised by the committee will be considered in the course of our deliberations.”
