Captains: safety of life at sea hampered by weather bill

Business Day reports that this was part of a barrage of criticism that greeted the water and environment affairs committee as it began public hearings on the bill. Several bodies declared the bill an unconstitutional limit on the right to freedom of expression as it contains decrees that no weather or pollution warnings may be issued without the permission of the weather service. The bill provides for fines of R5m-R10m, or up to 10 years in jail.

Master Mariners president Ron Whitehead told the committee that convention held the master of every ship meeting with dangerous ice, direct danger to navigation, tropical storms or freezing winds over force 10 "is bound to communicate the information by all means at his disposal to ships in the vicinity, and also to the competent authorities". He suggested the bill be amended so ships' masters could comply with international obligations without falling foul of the law. In a submission from e.tv, Steven Budlender and Nick Ferreira said if the TV station's meteorologists learnt from international sources that a severe storm was approaching SA and warned of this in a news broadcast, the station would be guilty of a crime.

Budlender and Ferreira added that Section 30 of the bill was unconstitutional as "it unjustifiably limits the right of freedom of expression and because it is impermissibly vague." Dr Robert Scholes, an expert on environmental information systems, told the committee weather modelling was done on a global basis as weather systems did not observe international boundaries. Weather observations were no longer the preserve of state services, he said, according to Business Day. "This bill, if applied as written, would [exclude] SA from being part of this change and all the benefits of better, quicker and cheaper weather services. The worst interpretation is that the bill seeks to shield the South African Weather Service from these changes, entrenching a monopolistic situation."

Read the full article on www.businessday.co.za.