Cooking up a conference

PLANNING the perfect conference is a bit like baking a cake - it's all about mixing the right ingredients in the right volumes in the right way. So, what makes a tasty conference?

Start off with a stunning five-star venue in one of Europe's most vibrant cities. Gradually stir in a stimulating programme featuring expert speakers from across the industry. Add just a pinch of a commanding chairman and top off with a social programme which includes dinner at one of Spain's leading wine estates. And there you have it - Barcelona's Shipping Law Forum 2002.

If the turnout was anything to go by, the programme for Barcelona's first one-day shipping law forum was spot-on. Opening with a special session on the Prestige, it went on to cover ship arrest and security, litigation, arbitration and ADR, and carriage of goods by sea - all proving a sufficient lure for more than ninety delegates from around the world, including over forty lawyers. Below are just some of the highlights and discussion points that came out of the one-day event held last December at Barcelona's showpiece Grand Marina Hotel.

Economic Incentives

Manuel Carlier, general manager of the Spanish Shipowners Association, did an excellent job of setting the scene for the morning session with a factual and pictorial overview of the events leading up to and following the Prestige incident. He went on to echo calls for better implementation of existing roles rather than introducing a whole new set of rules and regulations, and proposed the need for an increased role by class societies.

Brad Berman of LISCR also voiced concerns over the role of class societies, saying, "There are too many flag states and too many class societies that simply do not discharge their responsibilities. And there are too many owners willing to use them." According to Berman, it is down to the legislators to implement economic incentives to help drive owners towards only the best flag states and best class societies.

Ports of refuge

Quotable Quotes from the Forum Floor

"The system falls down when owners can choose a flag which has no system of control of its own, which has no desire to exert control, and which depends wholly on a laxly supervised delegation to class."
Brad Berman, executive vice-president and general council for the Liberian International Ship & Corporate Registry (LISCR)

"I think the steps put in place to improve safety at sea are working. And I have the proof, as there are plenty of admiralty lawyers out there looking for work."
Richard Sayer, former senior partner at Ince & Co and current chairman of Galbraith's shipbrokers

"Anyone whose mobile phone rings during the conference will be given a white coat and a one-way ticket to Galicia."
John Guy, Merlin Corporate Communications and consulting editor of The Maritime Advocate

An audience survey carried out by conference chairman John Guy revealed that fifty per cent of the delegates thought that the outcome of the Prestige was the fault of the Spanish government for not allowing the vessel into sheltered waters. Ports of refuge also featured high in the new ten-measure plan to improve accident response which was presented at the forum by Joop Timmermans, president of the International Salvage Union (ISU).

The issue of ports of refuge is also nothing new to John Noble of BMT Salvage Ltd. In fact, last year Noble made a statement claiming that in the near future the shipping industry would have a major incident on its hands as a result of a vessel being denied a port of refuge. Prophetic indeed. Speaking at the Barcelona forum, he had another warning for the industry.

"We have been lucky to date that all the major maritime incidents have been devastating from a pollution point of view only. Do we have to wait until we don't have oil washing up on our beaches but hazardous chemicals causing loss of human life before our governments start taking considered rather than knee-jerk decisions."

ADR - UK versus USA

The third session of the day was devoted to arbitration, litigation and mediation. Another survey showed that while half the audience is regularly involved in litigation, slightly fewer delegates are involved in arbitration and just a handful regularly participate in mediation. As David Taylor, special adviser to the International Underwriting Association of London (IUA), pointed out, for mediation to thrive it needs to be "accessible, affordable, efficient and reliable."

The UK has been busy extolling the virtues of mediation to the maritime industry with measured success. While mediation may have a greater following in the US, David did point out that, according to a recent periodical, US lawyers are happier to go for root canal work at the dentist than participate in mediation. Peter McLauchlan of Adams & Reese quickly jumped to the defence, saying that, while that may have been true in the 1980s it was primarily so among egotistical lawyers who liked the sound of their own voice, and was certainly not the case today.

Under the provocative heading of whether, with London as the world's legal centre, there is still a role for the rest of the world, Emily Derogee of AKD Prinsen Van Wijmen gave delegates an insight into the Netherlands arbitration platform, TAMARA which she chairs, and which promotes the advantages of arbitration in the Netherlands. "It was becoming all too easy for two Dutch lawyers to find themselves fighting out a dispute in London under a common law system that may be unfamiliar to them," she said. She went on to point out that not only is TAMARA competitive on price, it is possible to conduct arbitrations in a variety of languages - something London would be hard-pressed to beat.

Time Limits

Almost every area of the maritime industry would benefit from some form of uniformity, not least of all maritime law. One area in which Christoph Hasche of Hamburg-based Taylor Wessing believes uniformity needs to be introduced is time limits. Discrepancies among European jurisdictions were particularly highlighted, for example the time bars for claims by shipowners against charterers which vary from six months in Spain to six years in the UK. Many other questions remain unanswered in the area of time limits, including when the period begins to run, and whether time extensions and the stopping of time running are possible. (See Christoph's article in this issue).

By gathering together experts from the legal, shipowning, insurance and class and flag communities, the Barcelona Shipping Law Forum was able not only to discuss topics of interest but also to get clarity from those in the know. Starting at 0800hrs and ending at 1830hrs, it proved to be a long day. There was, however, a tasty carrot at the end of the stick in the form of a sumptuous dinner at the world-famous Codornui wine caves, courtesy of Barcelona-based lawyer, Ignacio de Ros, who also hosted the forum.

But, as anyone who has ever visited Spain will tell you, dinner doesn't usually take place until the late hours of the evening. So, before we were treated to dinner, we were whisked on open-top mini-trains around the Codornui cellars. Not only was this the ideal way to appreciate the vastness of the Codornui empire, but the chilly December climate definitely brought out the hunger and thirst in everyone. Thankfully we were soon seated in the warmth for a fine dinner, punctuated by even finer wines and accompanied by suitably festive classical music.

The organiser, Mare Forum, has certainly set the standard for 2003.