Wreck legislation

[Clare]

David Lammy is Culture Minister and as such will have input on the working party.

I have no axe to grind with the agencies - (please note I'm not suggesting my primary training agency ) but from a political perspective BSAC does have the most weight to offer this - PADI may train more divers but they are a global company and as such will not be as affected (or as influential) as a purely British organisation. BSAC have contacted me, if PADI want to join in then fine - I'd like as many places on the working groups as possible. I'm just not interested in internal dive agencies wars on this - it misses the point.

TBH - if anyone on here doesn't support what we are trying to do, fine. If you think it not worth the effort - equally fine - no-one is making you do anything - if others are prepared to try to head it off why should that bother you?

Just don't muddy the waters by giving anyone ammunition to suggest that divers either don't care or, worse, support the group going ahead without any representation from the sport.

[chrisch]

Yes its funny that an out of date club with falling numbers should be my representative in matters such as this, the reason that PADI should do it is that they have lots of money, i know i have to pay them every year, and it would affect them much more than BSAC. Also PADI already has conservation programmes in place, and has a track record of trying to save the underwater enviroment, at least on paper.

I think the key issue is which of the two organisations will do anything? PADI is not the governing body but does have a commercial interest in training and is the main organisation representing "the trade" as most dive centres and stores are PADI.

The ideal is that they work together and get the full support of TDI, IANTD, GUE, SSI et al.

Lets not forget wing-nut charlie is a BSACer and that most of the uniformed services had BSAC affiliation as does the HE sector.

If they (BSAC) let this slip they desrve a kicking and if they shine they deserve praise. I going to start on a positive note and suggest that BSAC will come good.

Chris

[CotoChris]

Why don't divers organise a protest march by the houses of parliament wearing their kit. That would atract atention to the media.

Agree with Claire that BSAC would have the most weight, being British as well. What is their current position on this?

[chrisch]

David Lammy is Culture Minister and as such will have input on the working party.

Hmmmph.

Not the best start.

Clare, apart from the obvious fax/letter stuff what is a useful practical step?

Do you think its worth setting up an email list for example so everyone can keep up to date?

Chris

[darthmoll]

I have no axe to grind with the agencies - (please note I'm not suggesting my primary training agency ) but from a political perspective BSAC does have the most weight to offer this - PADI may train more divers but they are a global company and as such will not be as affected (or as influential) as a purely British organisation.

TBH - if anyone on here doesn't support what we are trying to do, fine. If you think it not worth the effort - equally fine - no-one is making you do anything - if others are prepared to try to head it off why should that bother you?

Just don't muddy the waters by giving anyone ammunition to suggest that divers either don't care or, worse, support the group going ahead without any representation from the sport.

First to be clear, i would be very concerned about a ban on wreck diving and have already posted a letter to my MP and SMP.

I am suprised that you feel a comercial company, with a huge turnover in this country would not be affected by this ban as much a non profit making club. Its true the loss of jobs may cut no ice with the powers that be, but PADI would be able to say it has X number of dive centers in the UK and some of them would face closure, i am not 100% but i dont think BSAC have many that would be in the same position. Anyway i will say no more about the PADI V BSAC thing, in case it causes people to take their eye of the ball, and i want to keep on diving wrecks.

(Edited by Daz - Added square bracket to fix the quoted bit)

[Mike Rowley]

The reason I raised this issue on the BSAC forum and agreed to John copying it here is simply that this is a serious issue that could have lasting effects on all of us. If anyone doubts this they only have to look at issues where senior politicians have been under threat. They readily look for a convenient side issue to appease their back benchers, the press and ultimately their electorate and pursue that with enthusiasm.

The question " Are you in favour of allowing divers to descrate war graves and plunder underwater cultural heritage" is not dissimilar to "Are you in favour of race hatred?" Few MPs could resist such cheap and guarenteed kudos.

BSAC has been active in representing divers as have PADI and SAA. All of these organisations submitted responses to the consultative document in 2004. Jane Maddocks (BSAC NDC marine archeology adviser) has been consistantly active in lobbying for divers. However, they have not been allowed to participate in the review process conducted by the two committees of the DCM&S. These committees are entirely made up of marine archeologists, goverment agencies and bureaucrats.

The real danger is that the recommendations of these committees will form the basis for a Statutory Instrument which only needs a minister's signature to become law under primary legislation. It doesn't need to go before MPs. That primary legislation is already in place with the Protection of Military Remains Act 1986 and the Protection of historic wrecks act 1973. It was a statutory instrument that allowed the 12 designated sites and 4 protected places to be brought in under the Protoction of Military Remains Act. Part of this review process is looking at extending this list masively.

I think Andy Nye mentioned UNESCO. I have to correct you on that issue Andy. I sat on that committee and it didn't amount to nothing, as you said. UNESCO did bring in the UN Convention on Underwater Cultural Heritage which has been adopted by many countries around the world. The UK and USA refused to sign up to it. No official reason was given but it is suspected that the value of the international trade in marine antiques was the main factor. The value of the diving, angling and commercial fishing industries also had some influence. However, our goverment could sign up to it at any time and it could bring in many restrictions including allowing access to wrecks within 200 miles of a member state's coast to be regulated.

Someone else mentioned "How would they police it?" Well, there are numerous "interested" people who may volunteer to police it, similar to the League Against Crule Sports with hunting there is no shortage of zealots who have as their motto "Thou shalt not". In addition and increasingly, there are various government patrol vessels These days operated by HMC&E, MCA, harbour authorities and the police, not to mention the navy. The government could enforce it by making all vessels carry GPS location transmitters and monitoring vessel positions. They are considering going down that route with road pricing and it would merely be an extension of that technology. If they made the boat owners pay for the equipment it would cost the government little.

Finally, I think someone made a slightly personal observation about me based on "his mates testimony" I think. I would just like to correct what he said. I am not against people removing artifacts from wrecks in principle. However, I will admit to not being an ardent salvager these days myself. I do tell my customers that I will not allow them to recover artifacts from wrecks in French waters. The reason for this is that it is against the law to do so in France and there are draconian penalties for being caught. These include siezure of vessel and personal possessions, heavy fines and imprisonment. Having been on the wrong end of this process in 1992 I have no desire to repeat the experience.

Apologies for the long post.

Mike

[Janos]

BSAC has been active in representing divers as have PADI and SAA. All of these organisations submitted responses to the consultative document in 2004. Jane Maddocks (BSAC NDC marine archeology adviser) has been consistantly active in lobbying for divers. However, they have not been allowed to participate in the review process conducted by the two committees of the DCM&S. These committees are entirely made up of marine archeologists, goverment agencies and bureaucrats.

The real danger is that the recommendations of these committees will form the basis for a Statutory Instrument which only needs a minister's signature to become law under primary legislation. It doesn't need to go before MPs. That primary legislation is already in place with the Protection of Military Remains Act 1986 and the Protection of historic wrecks act 1973. It was a statutory instrument that allowed the 12 designated sites and 4 protected places to be brought in under the Protoction of Military Remains Act. Part of this review process is looking at extending this list masively.

Thanks Mike,

I guess the question is shouldn't BSAC / PADI / SAA / [Insert Other Agency here] be doing something to try and mobilise divers to at least sign a petition against this.

There are a lot of divers out there...

Janos

PS - Just off to the House now. Will try and lobby any MPs I see

[Keith L]

I cannot believe what I am reading here How you could turn such an issue into a BSAC vs PADI thing is beyond belief, and whilst I am at it where are the usual suspects demanding their "right" to rip things off of wrecks as they see fit?

OK, let's get a few things straight here, first of all please see http://www.bsacforum.co.uk/forums/sh...26806#poststop before anybody starts accusing the BSAC of ignoring such issues. For the record I have a document in front of me from our heritage officer detailing this issue, it is ongoing, it has been for some time actually. That document is a briefing to BSAC Council on this (and several other issues) that pre-dates your current indignation by several weeks, we have actually been dealing with it for far longer than that.

What is required here is a cross agency approach, that is exactly what the BSAC does, we liaise with and work with all of the diving agencies all of the time. I personally question whether PADI would be the best to represent all divers on this, quite simply because they could be dismissed by the powers-that-be of having a commercial axe to grind. The BSAC can and does represent all recreational divers, both amateur and professional, due to our very close working relationship with PADI (who we ask for advice on professional matters) I can assure you that all views would be heard. Because of our GB role we are the best people to liaise with government bodies, that's why we do it! But we take that role as being the representatives of all of the diving agencies, there are regular cross agency meetings where we all help each other.

So can we have a bit less of the "them and us" please, as divers we're all in this together and if you want to fail at the first hurdle then start squabbling amongst yourselves. Rather than all rushing off in different directions I think that we need to take stock, let's pool all of our resources, work out between us all the best way to handle this. My thanks to all of the divers who have taken an interest, you're right in thinking that this is a very serious issue. We're (BSAC) happy to work with anybody on this, style of Q card irrelevant, but we do need to act as one as divers with wide ranging interests and with one voice.

Here we go again!

Keith L
BSAC Council

[Clare]

Well at least you will buy lunch Janos

This is the text that I have prepares for anyone who would like to write to their MP. This is a basis only, please feel free to amend, put in local info, your own experiences etc.

House of Commons
London
SW1A 0AA

Dear (find your MP here)

I write to you as one of the 150,000 active UK divers.

Two Governmental working parties have been set up by the Department for Culture Media and Sport to look at wreck legislation. One group is looking at salvage law, the other at wreck designation and protection.

The original consultation called for “A positive approach to managing the marine historic environment, which will be transparent, inclusive, effective and sustainable and central to social, environmental and economic agendas at a local as well as national level and a legislative framework that protects the marine historic environment but enables appropriate management techniques to be applied and evolve.”

No organisation has more interest in the identification and preservation of wrecks than the active UK diving community, whose co-operation will greatly assist efforts to protect and catalogue our underwater heritage. Yet the Department for Culture Media and Sport has not permitted any representation on these working groups from the Diving organisations.

I would therefore be grateful if you would write, on my behalf, to the Minister responsible for this at the DCMS, David Lammy, asking that representatives from UK diving organisations are invited to join and contribute to the working parties and let me have sight of the Minister’s reply.

ENDS

You may, in addition, wish to write to David Lammy directly at the DCMS and to Mark Field MP (Shadow Minister for Culture) at the House of Commons.

If you live in a costal area, or run a dive busniess, make sure your MP knows this. I may follow up any answers to questions with an EDM so hang on to your MPs address and you can write back and ask him to sign it.

[mark g]

would this legislation affect sea anglers at all? might be worth involving them if it might