Merchant Shipping (Safety and Load Line Conventions) Act 1932

Loading of Timber.

61 Carriage of timber deck cargo.

(1) The Board of Trade shall make regulations (hereafter in this section referred to as the " timber cargo regulations") as to the conditions on which timber may be carried as cargo in any uncovered space on the deck of any load line ship.

(2) The timber cargo regulations shall contain such regulations as appear to the Board of Trade to be necessary for the purpose of giving effect to paragraph two of Article six of the Load Line Convention.

(3) Subject to the provisions of the last foregoing subsection, the timber cargo regulations may prescribe generally the conditions on which timber may be carried as aforesaid in any load line ship either on all voyages or on any particular class of voyages and either at all seasons or at any particular season, and in particular may prescribe the manner and position in which the timber is to be stowed and the provision which is to be made on the ship for the safety of the crew.

(4) If any provision of the timber cargo regulations is contravened in the case of any British load line ship registered in the United Kingdom, the master of the ship shall be liable to a fine not exceeding five hundred pounds:

Provided that in any proceedings against a master in respect of a contravention of the timber cargo regulations, it shall be a good defence to prove that the contravention was due solely to deviation or delay, being deviation or delay caused solely by stress of weather or other circumstances which neither the master nor the owner nor the charterer (if any) could have prevented or forestalled.

(5) For securing the observance of the timber cargo regulations, any officer having authority in that behalf from the Board of Trade, either general or special, shall have power to inspect any load line ship carrying timber cargo in any uncovered space on her deck, and for that purpose shall have all the powers of a Board of Trade inspector under the principal Act.

(6) The foregoing provisions of this section and the timber cargo regulations shall apply to load line ships not registered in the United Kingdom, while they are within any port in the United Kingdom, as they apply to British load line ships registered in the United Kingdom.