Merchant Shipping (Safety Convention) Act 1949

36Interpretation

(1)In this Act the following expressions have the meanings hereby respectively assigned to them, that is to say:—

• " Accepted Safety Convention certificate " has the meaning assigned to it by section fourteen of this Act;

• " Collision regulations " means regulations made under section four hundred and eighteen of the principal Act;

• " Construction rules " means rules made under section one of this Act;

• " Country to which the Safety Convention applies " means—

  (a)

  a country the government of which has been declared under section thirty-one of this Act to have accepted the Safety Convention, and has not been so declared to have denounced that Convention ;

  (b)

  a territory to which it has been so declared that the Safety Convention extends, not being a territory to which it has been so declared that that Convention has ceased to extend ;

• " Declaration of survey " means a declaration made under section two hundred and seventy-two of the principal Act;

• " International voyage " means a voyage from a port in one country to a port in another country, either of those countries being a country to which the Safety Convention applies, and " short international voyage " means an international voyage—

  (a)

  in the course of which a ship is not more than two hundred nautical miles from a port or place in which the passengers and crew could be placed in safety and

  (b)

  which does not exceed six hundred nautical miles in length between the last port of call in the country in which the voyage begins and the final port of destination; so however that for the purpose of the definitions contained in this paragraph—

  (i)

  no account shall be taken of any deviation by a ship from her intended voyage due solely to stress of weather or any other circumstance that neither the master nor the owner nor the charterer (if any) of the ship could have prevented or forestalled ; and

  (ii)

  every colony, overseas territory, protectorate or other territory for whose international relations a government that has accepted the Safety Convention is responsible, or for which the United Nations are the administering authority, shall be deemed to be a separate country ;

• " The Merchant Shipping Acts " means the Merchant Shipping Acts, 1894 to 1948, and this Act;

• " The Minister " means the Minister of Transport;

• " The principal Act " means the Merchant Shipping Act, 1894;

• " Radio navigational aid " means radio apparatus on board a ship being apparatus designed for the purpose of determining the position or direction of ships or other objects;

• " Radio rules " means rules made under section three of this Act;

• " Rules for direction-finders " means rules made under section five of this Act;

• " Rules for life-saving appliances " means rules made under section four hundred and twenty-seven of the principal Act as amended by section two of this Act;

• " Safety Convention ship " means a ship registered in a country to which the Safety Convention applies; and the expression " Safety Convention passenger steamer " shall be construed accordingly.

(2)If any amendment of the Safety Convention comes into force, references in this Act to the Safety Convention shall, unless the context otherwise requires, be construed as references to the Safety Convention as amended.