Northern Ireland Act 1962

23 Amendment of Merchant Shipping Act, 1894, as to compensation for plundering wrecked, and c, vessel or its cargo

(1) Section five hundred and fifteen of the Merchant Shipping Act, 1894 (compensation for plundering, damaging or destroying vessel wrecked, stranded or in distress or its cargo or apparel) shall be amended by substituting, for the words from " In Ireland " to the end, the words " In Northern Ireland, in pursuance of an application in that behalf to the county court", but no compensation shall be made in Northern Ireland under that section unless the aggregate amount of the plunder, damage or destruction exceeds twenty pounds.

(2) Subsection (1) of section four of the Criminal Injuries Act (Northern Ireland), 1956 (which empowers a county court, in determining an application for compensation under that Act, to reduce the amount of compensation which it would otherwise award by such sum as it thinks just and equitable having regard to the general conduct in the circumstances of the person suffering the damage, including, in particular, his conduct as respects any precautions which might reasonably have been taken by him to avoid the damage) shall have effect in relation to an application made in Northern Ireland by virtue of this section as it has effect in relation to an application under that Act but with the substitution, for references to the damage, of references to the plunder, damage or destruction to which the application relates and, for the reference to compensation under that Act, of a reference to compensation under the said section five hundred and fifteen.

(3) The said section five hundred and fifteen shall, in its application to Northern Ireland, be subject to the like restrictions with respect to the making thereunder of compensation for plunder, damage or destruction as those to which the said Act of 1956 is, by virtue of subsections (2), (3) and (5) of section four thereof, subject with respect to the payment under that Act of compensation for damage, and those subsections shall apply accordingly with requisite modifications.

(4) Sections five to nine of the said Act of 1956 shall have effect in relation to an application made in Northern Ireland by virtue of this section and to matters consequential on the making of such an application as they have effect in relation to an application under that Act and to matters consequential on the making of such an application subject, however, to the following modifications:—

(a) for references to the damage to which the application relates there shall be substituted references to the plunder, damage or destruction to which it relates; and

(b) subsection (1) of section five shall have effect as if, at the end thereof, there were added the words " or, in a case where the plunder, damage or destruction or the greater part thereof occurred outside a county, against the council of the county nearest to the place where it occurred ".