Pressure Sores

The newspapers have recently informed us that "irresistible pressures” ended an investigation by the Serious Fraud Office into alleged high-level bribery and corruption. In the strange WMD intelligence dossier case, as well as in several other notable affaires, the same sort of pressures seem to have played their part, blocking inquiries or driving them towards a convenient, pre-ordained outcome.

These histories bring to mind the “pressures” applied on the protagonists in another failed governmental investigation: the 2004 Gaul RFI. I recall now that, following the publication of the Gaul RFI final report, a participant in the formal investigation commented that the Wreck Commissioner (justice David Steel) seemed to have his own agenda when probing the reasons for the tragedy; the implication being that outside “pressures” might have weighed upon His Honour more than the available evidence and testimonies.

Having tried for almost two years now to have the conclusions of the 2004 RFI re-examined, we have realised that the bodies responsible for dealing with the concerns that had been raised also seemed to be under some kind of nocuous “pressures” from which they couldn't escape.

Pressures, as we know from the laws of physics, can be harmful to a body when they outbalance the body’s ability to stand firm. Therefore, so as to prevent injury to our public bodies we must either restrain these terrible forces, or, somehow, invigorate the former’s ability to resist and respond.

Corruption

"The word corruption means something spoiled: something sound that has been made defective, debased, and tainted; something that has been pushed off course into a worse or inferior form. Whoever corrupts sets out to make something impure and less capable, an adverse departure from an expected course.
When applied to human relations, corruption is a bad influence, an injection of rottenness or decay, a decline in moral conduct and personal integrity attributable to venality or dishonesty. When applied to public office, rather than referring to departures from ideal or even generally expected standards of incumbent behavior, the practice has been to spell out specific acts of misconduct that disgrace public office and make the offenders unfit to remain there."

"Corruption leads to a breakdown in shared concerns and results in factional pursuit of special interests and a reliance on coercion over consensus.
Indeed, reliance on coercion indicates a corrupt or corrupted state, perverted and rotten, where every person is on guard against everyone else in a society of amoral familism." (Where Corruption Lives, 2001, Corruption and Governance, Gerald E. Caiden)

The judge

Justice Steel, the Wreck Commissioner in the 2004 Gaul RFI, his term having recently expired, has stepped down from the Presidency of the Commercial Court.
In spite of our tenacious attempts, we have never managed to establish a direct contact with His Honour, as he has been very agile at avoiding us.
There is sparse data in the public domain about the life and career of justice Steel, so, for your information, we can only provide an extract from Who’s Who 2006 catalogue:

STEEL, Hon. Sir David (William), Knighted in 1998; Hon Mr Justice Steel; a judge of the High Court of Justice, since 1998; Presiding Judge, Western Circuit, since 2002; born 7 May 1943; son of Lincoln Steel and late Barbara (née Goldschmidt); [In January 1998, on the recommendation of the Lord Chancellor (Lord Irvine, Tony Blair’s former mentor) he was appointed High Court Judge]; Judge Admiralty Court 1998-; Judge Commercial Court 1998-; a Wreck Commissioner for England and Wales 1982-1998; Chairman, Commercial Bar Association, 1990-1991; Member, Lord Chancellor’s Advisory Committee on Legal Education and Conduct, 1994-1998; Chairman, OUBC Trust Fund Committee, 1990-1993

Mr Steel has represented the Government on a number of memorable occasions:

In 1987, he represented the Department of Transport and had conduct of the Formal Investigation into the Herald of Free Enterprise disaster at Zeebrugge. (188 lives lost with the casualty attributed to serious negligence by the crew)

In 1989, he again represented the Department of Transport and had conduct of the Formal Investigation into the loss of the MV Derbyshire. (44 lives lost with the vessel considered to have been overwhelmed by the forces of nature – not a design fault as alleged by the families of the victims)

Mr Steel’s involvement in the Gaul legal case started in 1978 when A.M. Jackson & Co., Solicitors for the Insurance Company, engaged Michael Thomas QC and David Steel to advise on the defence on the negligence charge that had been brought against the Gaul Owners and Builders.[1],[2]
In 2000, the guiding hand of fate brought David Steel once again at the epicentre of the Gaul saga - this time as Wreck Commissioner in the Re-opened Formal Investigation (RFI).
The victims’ families - I have been informed - as if possessed by a sombre premonition, tried to recuse him from the RFI on the basis of his previous involvement in the case.
However, although it is stated in law that a judge can be recused by opposition of either party or disqualify himself on grounds of prejudice or personal involvement, and despite the fact that there were certainly many others capable of sitting as Wreck Commissioner for the Investigation, the families’ resistance to justice Steel’s appointment did not succeed, and they had to contend themselves with the Commissioner chosen by the government.

Having always held the judges of this country in some kind of veneration, after our disclosures, we expected Sir David to show some last-minute sympathy towards the idea of putting right what he had obviously let go wrong. As Admiralty judge and head of for the 2004 Investigation, he was in a good position to recommend a re-opening of the case.

We were, however, to be disappointed: justice Steel decided to hide and stay quiet.
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[1] The Loss of the Motor Trawler Gaul, by John Nicklin, 1998
[2] The owner of the shipyard in 1978 was British Shipbuilders (a State Corporation), hence Mr Steel was effectively acting for the Government of the day (i.e. Labour)

Another piece of misleading evidence

An important plank in the Attorney General’s case against the crew of the Gaul was the instilled notion that they were not experienced in operating trawlers fitted with hull openings for the discharge of fish processing waste.

The case made was that, because the crew had no experience of such ships, they would not have been able to appreciate the importance of such openings in relation to the vessel’s stability and watertight integrity. Their subsequent ‘errors’ in not maintaining the duff and offal chute’s flaps and ‘forgetting’ to close the inner covers could thus be more readily explained.

The Attorney General’s team developed this theme throughout the course of the hearings (see extracts from the transcripts of evidence in the DOCUMENT ATTACHED), and even went as far as providing a detailed general arrangement drawing for the freezer trawler Cassio (Appendix 7 of the final report), which showed, they said, that duff and offal chutes had not been fitted on that vessel.

A small point to note:

A ship’s general arrangement drawing carries a level of detail that is decided by the draughtsman with clarity, aesthetical and presentational aspects being important considerations. The general arrangement drawing that was presented as evidence to the Gaul RFI merely confirmed that duff and offal chute openings had not been indicated on that drawing, it did not confirm that they had not been provided on the vessel.

In a 1966 photograph of the Othello, possibly on sea trials, its duff and offal discharges, cut in the hull on the port side, can be seen just aft of the funnel and near to the waterline.

The freezer stern trawlers Cassio, Othello and Orsino were sister vessels, built by Yarrows of Glasgow in 1966. The Gaul’s Skipper, Peter Nellist, sailed on both the Cassio and the Orsino, while the Mate, Maurice Spurgeon, had sailed on the Othello immediately prior to joining the Gaul on her last voyage.

Tony Blair manages to unite the peoples of Europe and beyond

The European Tribune has published an online petition Petition against the nomination of Tony Blair as President of the European Council: http://www.gopetition.com/petitions/stopblair.html.

Marking the day

8 February - the day when the Gaul and 36 lives were lost

Lack of strength

We have previously mentioned that the inner covers of the duff and offal chutes on the Gaul were not designed to be of watertight standard. Our post of 24 September 2007 states that the inner covers of the duff and offal chutes on the Gaul were not watertight, nor were they supposed to be so, and, even closed, they could not have been relied upon to maintain the watertight integrity of the vessel.

We would now like to explain that the main reason why the inner covers on the Gaul were not of a ‘watertight’ standard is because they were deficient in strength.That is the hinges, toggle bolts and steel lugs – the only parts of the covers, which provided the strength or resistance against the forces of the sea – were inadequate.

The paper published HERE gives the details.

More to come…

The rust

In our previous posts of 30 January 2007 and 9 April 2007 (incl. the ADDITIONAL DATA document) as well as our TECHNICAL REPORT etc., we explained in detail why it was unlikely that the non-return flaps of the duff and offal chutes on the Gaul should have both been seized in the open position, due to corrosion, at the time when the vessel was lost.
The hinge assemblies of the non-return flaps contained oilite low-maintenance bearings (oil impregnated sintered bronze), which were designed for the life of the vessel and not just for the 18 months period that was the lifespan of the Gaul.
Furthermore, the extracts from the underwater survey footage presented in our 30 January post showed clearly that, even after 28 years under the sea, other structures on the Gaul, which used the same combination of materials as the flaps’ hinges, worked without problem.

Now, we are adding the statements of two witnesses who had sailed on the Gaul on her previous voyages including the last but one.

Skipper Suddaby, whom we mentioned earlier on this site, tells us in his recently published book, at page 167 that: “I believe firmly that both chutes were in perfect working order right up to the time that the Gaul was lost” and that: “there is no report of the Gaul crew having trouble dumping the duffs back”.

Also, Mr. Petty, who had been the mate of the Gaul from 18 September 1973 to January 1974, when questioned under oath during the RFI, gave the following answers:

“Q. Can you remember using that hopper on the last trip you were on when you were with Mr. Suddaby?
A. What, the Gaul?
Q. Yes.
A. Yes.
Q. What was its condition at that time, can you remember? Was it working or was --
A. It was all working, yes, everything was working perfect.
Q. Did you ever have any problems with it or did the men have any problems where it seized up and so would not open when they threw duffs on it?
A. Never. That is the gospel truth, never.” (Transcripts of evidence, day 2 page 46)

The RFI conclusions, however, stated that the non-return flaps of the chutes were seized in the open position when the vessel left Hull on her last voyage (See RFI final report, page 286).If the chutes had been working perfectly well and smoothly during the Gaul’s first four voyages, as the witnesses testified, how could the RFI panel expect the public to believe that they were seized with corrosion when the vessel left Hull at the start of her fifth and last voyage? [1]

The RFI panel of experts and justice Steel should perhaps explain to us why they chose to flagrantly ignore all these facts and testimonies and go for the ‘rust theory’, in support of which they had no proper evidence.

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[1] The question of why two separate mechanisms, which had been appropriately engineered for the marine environment, which would have been fully greased and lubricated at the vessel’s delivery, which had different operating cycles and which were operated by two separate teams of ship personnel, should both seize in the fully open position due to corrosion and at approximately the same time, is rather intriguing.
As the RFI panel was informed during the investigation, it is far more likely that the non-return valves shared some fault in their DESIGN, which manifested itself during the severe weather conditions that the vessel encountered prior to its loss.

Cui Bono

More than two years have passed since a naval architect, working for the Maritime and Coastguard Agency, first blew the whistle on the pathetic swindle that had been the 2004 Re-opened Formal Investigation into the sinking of the trawler Gaul.

For more than two years the British authorities have systematically failed to openly acknowledge his disclosures and take the steps prescribed by law to protect the public interest in such circumstances, although, behind the scenes, a lot of energy has been spent both in blocking the information and trying to suppress the whistle-blower.

One should wonder why, in a fishing vessel tragedy, of which there have been many, such huge efforts have been spent in controlling the information, while many other transgressions on the part of the government have already been revealed and - although no corrections were ever applied - publicly condemned. To whose benefit it is to obscure the last chapters in the story of the Gaul?

The explanation, we consider, may lie in the fact that, in the Gaul case, things have gone a bit too far – certainly further than many would find it pleasant to think about.
The events that have taken place can show a dangerous pattern in the New Labour government’s conduct and allow links to be made with other more infamous and still unresolved affairs.
It is also feared that the story could somehow cast doubt on the integrity of the ex-Attorney General, on whose legal advice and authority this country was taken to war. But most of all, it is feared that, if publicly acknowledged, the Gaul story could spin out of control and lead to direct accusations against the ex-Prime Minister, Tony Blair, and his shady network of allies.

As John Prescott oversaw the Gaul Re-opened Formal Investigation and its aftermath, it was only natural that abuses of power should have marked the course of events.
In 2006, John Prescott was still Deputy Prime Minister, his physical presence as second in command was vital to Tony Blair, shielding his shaky premiership from the surging political tempests. A total ban on the disclosures, by any means, was therefore necessary at the time and, surprisingly, all too easily applied.

More outrageous, however, is that, in order to put a lid on the leaks, the Blair government decided to use, not only the state’s repressive machine, but also foreign bodies. These abuses compounded the problem and increased the number of those with a vested interest in concealing the truth.

When Tony Blair finally left office, a short period of uncertainty followed. Soon, however, the new PM appeared to take over from where his predecessor had left off.
The reasons why the present government decided to continue perpetrating the injustice are, to us, still rather unclear.
It may be that, aware of the general political fall out with New Labour, which could ensue, should all the facts come to the surface, the new administration is unwilling to take appropriate action. It may be that our new PM is bound to protect the future political career of his predecessor.

It may be, moreover, imperative to prevent any related additional disclosures that may touch upon the EU power structures and those foreign agencies whose acts and identity many do not wish to see revealed.

Meanwhile, in our lawless land, the Gaul culprits continue to spread the blood around, confident in the knowledge that, when too few are left with a clear conscience, their wrongs can no longer be condemned.

Who’s calling the shots?

In our post of 21 November 2007 we brought to your attention the fact that, in July last year, we had sent an email to the Specialist Crime Unit in the Metropolitan Police, a copy of which we are now publishing below:

To: yyyyyy@met.police.uk
Cc: wwwwww@met.police.uk
Sent: Thursday, July 19, 2007 3:11 PM
Subject: FV Gaul Investigation

Dear Sir,

I refer to our complaint of 19 March 2007 on the subject of the FV Gaul Investigation and the documents subsequently submitted to you.
We would be grateful if you could send us an email/letter advising whether the additional evidence supplied to you by email on 24 April, and during our meeting of 25 April, together with the extra information published on our website (http://the-trawler-gaul.blogspot.com & www.freewebs.com/inconvenientcitizen) before and after these dates, is sufficient for you to launch and investigation, or you would still like us to arrange the submission of further clarifications.

Many thanks and kind regards,

xxxxxxxxxxxxx

Four more emails were sent in the following four months, emails that apparently were never received.

At the end of October, after a promise for a timely reply to our query, the detective in charge disappeared from our radar.

However, in December last year, when I eventually managed to get in touch with him again, I was promised that a reply would be forthcoming in early January 2008.

Worried about their prolonged silence and after another unanswered email, yesterday, I telephoned the Police and thus found out that, six months after we had first posed the question, the Met was still unable to offer us a reply.

It appears that the heads of the Met, who, by the laws of hierarchy, are granted the power to decide on such matters, or maybe their superiors, have not yet decided what to do in the Gaul case; and whatever they may be thinking now they will not put in writing.

Do any political bodies have their fingers in this?

Almost as intriguingly it was to hear that the Fraud Squad detectives couldn’t access our blog since their web-surfing is constrained by a parental firewall.

To view frivolous sites like ours, they need, it seems, to follow a bureaucratic procedure: that is to apply for and obtain special approvals from above.

This, to my untrained ears, sounded rather baffling, considering the fact that, amongst other offences, they also deal with Internet fraud.

Well, with the money they get, I’m surprised they are still there.

Problems

“I think people know that when a problem arises we will deal with it” said our Prime Minister on a recent occasion.

Turbulence in the provinces, abuses and debauchery at the centre, enemies pushing at the gates, his personal fears and indecision on top of that, have, unfortunately, so far prevented the head of our government to deal with many sensitive and controversial problems.

History teaches us what to expect from our leaders. It tells us about Alexander the Great who solved his problem by a bold stroke of sword instead of wasting his time unpicking the knot. He did not claim the puzzle was unsolvable, nor was he indecisive in battle.It tells us about many other prominent statesmen who fought to defend the rule of law and the public order that the nation had entrusted to them.

History also supplies us with other, less providential, examples: the story of Pierro de Medici, also called the ‘Unfortunate’, who gave in to Charles VIII of France’s invading army, offering everything he demanded, without any attempt to negotiate better terms.
Or the case of the Carl Severing, the Prussian Minister of the Interior, who accepted to be, literally, driven out of office, declaring simply:’ I surrender to a mightier force’, and thus helped establish the Nazi regime in Europe. He believed he was being realistic, bowing before the unavoidable. Everything would be in vain, he thought. His social democrats didn’t even try to oppose the Nazis, justifying their passivity with the same “it’s useless” sort of resignation. Would it have really been useless?

As a theologian once said, each of our actions sets in motion a new series of possibilities, and, since their timing and probability cannot be perfectly predicted, we have to give the unforeseeable a chance. Especially when worse problems may otherwise arise.

Love to know

In January this year, Mr Chris Huhne, LibDem MP for Eastleigh, asked the Secretary of State for Transport, “whether she and her predecessor have met (a) Mr. David Abrahams and (b) representatives of Mr. Abrahams' companies since 2004”.

The answer to Mr Huhne’s question was delivered by Jim Fizpatrick, Parliamentary Under-Secretary at the Department for Transport. From him, we learned that “the Secretary of State and her predecessors have not attended meetings in their official capacity since 2004 with Mr. David Abrahams or representatives of companies registered to Mr Abrahams.”

Being rather curious by nature, we couldn’t help wondering why his reply made particular reference to potential meetings between Mr Abrahams and the Secretary of State for Transport/her predecessor in her/his official capacity.

How about unofficial encounters?

'Nothing to be done'

In December last year we were given an unexpected opportunity of which I must give you a description.

After a number of unanswered telephone calls and emails, we were invited for an appointment with our Romsey MP, Mrs Sandra Gidley. (Our post of 17 March 2007 indicates the stage at which we had left off with her.)

During our 15 min allocated slot, Mrs Gidley let us know that the Gaul saga was the most frustrating thing she had had to deal with, and that she didn’t know where to go with it anymore.
Moreover, the Romsey MP feared that this case was taking a lot of her time, which could otherwise be spent resolving things for her constituents – things that have a better chance of getting a resolution. The Gaul affair, in her opinion, was going round in circles, and had already exhausted her resourcefulness.
Basically, it was a case of ‘Nothing to be done’, as Estragon said while waiting for Godot.
As she could not see a way forward herself, she called for our suggestions, in view of one more attempt, the last one, from her.

Eager to avail ourselves of her last favour, we suggested that she could ask - the Home Secretary, this time - why the Fraud Squad have been dragging their feet for almost a year in following up our fraud complaint.
Mrs Gidley would not go for that though. Trying to impress on us the futility of our endeavours, and lightly amused with our ignorance of the sacred rites of contemporary parliamentary procedures and political confrontations, she informed us that there was always a battle with the Table Office about how and to whom Parliamentary Questions should be addressed – a battle which, in this case, it seems, was not worth fighting.
She was already anticipating that our question would not be passed to the Home Office, but to another department.
She could write a letter to the Home Secretary instead… at least initially… she suggested. Then, if all fails, she could, perhaps, address a Parliamentary Question. We’ll see…
(This implied dragging on matters further, at least until the end of March, as some would dearly hope.)

So, we pondered, Parliamentary Questions are no longer an effective tool for holding the government to account, and Parliament is no longer a deliberative assembly, but a fortified temple where politicians find shelter and escape the consequences of their actions.
We asked our MP how it felt sitting in the House of Commons in such company.
Unmoved, Mrs Gidley recommended that we should not believe what we read in the newspapers.
Ah, well, we thought, if only things were that rosy…
We reminded our MP that, in our view, a number of offences had been committed, and that we were able to substantiate our allegations beyond reasonable doubt. However, having learned from our past mistakes, and as Mrs Gidley was not employed by the Met, we did not wish to pass her all the details.

Finally, Mrs Gidley assured us that, unlike her, many MPs would have given up on this matter long before, right after the first set of parliamentary questions and the unsatisfactory answers received thereto.

[…] “Such is life,” Estragon would have added.

Perhaps Sandra Gidley is right. Challenging the ethical indifference of our current politicians may not be an easy job; it may be as maddening and exhaustive as waiting pointlessly for a Godot to come. Perhaps life under the New Labour regime has changed us all, making us more prone to defeatism and cynical practicality, and blunting our capacity for indignation – that healthy human reaction which, as a philosopher put it, once separated us emotionally from wickedness and injustice.

***

“Why are we here, that is the question? And we are blessed in this, that we happen to know the answer. Yes, in this immense confusion on thing is clear. We are waiting for Godot to come.” Samuel Beckett, Waiting for Godot

An old theory re-surfaces

At the beginning of December, a new book saw the light of the day. Fishing Explorer – authored by Ernest Suddaby, a former skipper of the Gaul, and published by Maritime Info UK Ltd - makes a very pleasurable read.
Put together with brilliant literary skill, printed in excellent graphic conditions and warmly prefaced by Alan Johnson MP, the book offers the reader a rich source of documentary information and photographic material.
The book carries two main narrative threads: one which depicts the author’s trip to the Falklands and one recounting his time as skipper onboard the Gaul, interspersed with personal memories and anecdotes.

In his account of the Gaul, along with his impressions and recollections of past events and more recent developments in the Gaul saga – many of which are well worthy of note - the author also shares with us his disagreement with the results of the 2004 Formal Investigation, and his personal opinions as to the causes that might have led to the loss of the vessel.In the author’s view, the sinking of the Gaul was caused by foul weather and bad luck, which led to flooding through the two fish loading hatches cut into the trawl deck. These hatches, it is suggested, could have been opened by the pull of gravity, when the vessel rolled beyond 90 degrees in heavy seas.

Mr Suddaby’s hypothesis is not that new, in fact it has been, if we may say so, previously enjoyed. It is what the results of the first formal inquiry, held in 1974, implied. The MAIB also flirted with this theory for a while, although, after the 2002 underwater survey and further reflection, they decided to abandon it. They did not, however, explain very well why.

Therefore, we have taken it upon ourselves to try and present the reasons why this loss scenario is merely a conception (so as not to say mis-conception) rather than a real possibility.
To elucidate matters, we have compiled the video clip below, which, in a simplified manner, attempts to show how the fish loading hatches on the Gaul would have behaved under various roll conditions. The model presented therein shows that gravity – which inexorably acts downwards at all times and circumstances - would have had the effect of keeping the hatch covers closed and prevented seawater from getting inside the ship, when the ship rolled to an angle of 90 degrees from its vertical position. The model also shows that, when the ship rolled beyond 90 degrees, the hatch covers would have still been kept closed by seawater pressure, and that this would have happened even without taking into account the effects of the hydraulic ram system, which was connected to the hatches.

Enjoy!

Commentless

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* image based on a cartoon by Dan Perjovski

The broken pact

In our post of July 12 2007, we explained that, according to the 1995 Merchant Shipping Act and the 2006 Fraud Act, the Secretary of State for Transport would be likely to commit the offence of fraud by abuse of position, if she did not order a re-opening of the Gaul Investigation in the light of the evidence we presented.

Six months have passed since and, having failed to take appropriate action or to provide any reasonable justification, not even a word, in support of her decision not to re-examine the case, Mrs Ruth Kelly, currently at the helm of the Department for Transport, appears to be either ill-advised or consciously in breach of the law.

As Lenin and his associates used to dismiss the law as bourgeois sham, the New Labour regime shows a similar contempt for legality, though not so much for ideological reasons, as out of recklessness and a lack of ethical commitment.

The significance of the rule of law in the survival of a democracy is not a complicated concept to appreciate – it guards against tyranny and holds society together. When the political power applies the rules discriminately and self-interestedly, the tacit pact between society and the state - which, in the end, gives the law its legitimacy - is broken.

The New Labour government, however, doesn’t seem to worry too much over these consequences.

Inventions and devices

In our previous posts we uncovered a number of inadequacies in the expert analysis carried out during the 2004 Gaul RFI.

More recently, we have highlighted some serious flaws in the RFI analysis pertaining to the Gaul’s sinking scenario.
Yesterday, we raised doubts as to the quality of the information put forward by the RFI panel of experts in their paper: ‘The Loss of the M.F.V Gaul’ which was presented to the Royal Institution of Naval Architects in 2006.

Today, we would like to go back to that same paper and question why a door self-closing mechanism, similar to the one pictured below, was mentioned only in that document, while the 2004 RFI report, the transcripts of evidence or other related sources do not seem to include any reference to such a device.

“8.3(c) Flooding of liver plant

Subsequent to the model testing, it was found although the door from the factory to the liver plant room……………. The door was partially shut by a self-closing device…”

The answer may be quite simple: without such a device, which would have allowed floodwater to become trapped inside the liver plant room (and thus change the stability behaviour of the vessel), the vessel-sinking scenario chosen by the RFI experts would have been less plausible.

Apart from the lack of evidence as to the existence of a self-closer, it is also important to note that the door to the liver plant room on the factory deck was a weathertight door to which - naval architects know it is neither standard shipbuilding practice nor stated norm - self-closing devices are not fitted because they do not work correctly.

Hyperbolic representation

On 25 January 2006, the Gaul RFI experts panel presented a paper entitled ‘The Loss of the M.F.V Gaul’ (see http://www.bctq.com/downloads/Gaul.pdf) to the Royal Institution of Naval Architects. This paper - a summary on the work the experts had concluded during the 2004 RFI - flatly states:

“There was no logical reason why the duff and offal chute lids were secured in the open position, whilst dodging, other than crew error. It is also difficult to understand why the flap valves were jammed in the open position other than bad maintenance onboard or shore.”

Familiar perhaps with the old wisdom that a good slogan can stop fifty years of analysis, or maybe emboldened by the calm passage of time, the Gaul experts claimed in their paper more certainty for the results of the 2004 RFI than the course of the proceedings ever warranted, and confidently put forward a more unequivocal explanation for the open state of the chutes’ inner lids.

Thus, what justice Steel and his associates had delicately implied at the end of the RFI, fourteen months later, the experts laid down in more explicit language, adding extra detail, specificity and emphasis to what the legal staff had left unsaid.

Had our Gaul experts been more scrupulous in checking their notes, the RFI transcripts of evidence and the final report, they would have remembered that the duff and offal chutes’ lids had not actually been found secured in the open position. Though, of course, the implication that the lids had been found so allowed the crew error/negligence label to be much more easily attached.

The Government's Reform Agenda

A number of critical observations on the Professional Skills Competency Framework - a strategic element of the government's Reform Agenda have been published at: http://www.xanga.com/Amilcarre

Seen as a new lever in the appropriation of the Civil Service by the political power, the plan could grant politicised senior management undue discretionary control over professional staff within the Service.

Cultivating detachment

Our press release (see the post below) seems to have, to some extent, flooded the Internet. Why, we didn’t really foresee that...

Anyway, we now ought to go back to the first pieces in the Gaul RFI domino chain - the Department for Transport.
Next week we will be celebrating two months since we first asked the Department for the names of those elusive in-house technical experts who, allegedly, advised the DfT not to re-open the Gaul investigation. (See our posts of 13 November and 31 October.).

Given that to act is inconceivable and not to act is unfeasible, the latest message from the head of Shipping Policy unit in the DfT, delivered cautiously via intermediaries, was that we should continue waiting.
Now, it appears, is not a good time to have our curiosity satisfied. The omens look unfavourable to the government for the moment.

***

“The Government is urging all the citizens of the big towns to cultivate detachment. According to this, it’s our last hope of finding an answer to the economic crisis, the confusion of the spirit and the problems of existence.” Eugène Ionesco, Victims of Duty

Press Release

A press release entitled "Perversion of justice, corruption, fraud and the lack of accountability of the British government" has been published on a couple of independent media websites.

You can read it at the following link: http://www.indymedia.org.uk/en/2007/11/386173.html

The leaders we deserve

"Leadership is no place for men and women who hesitate to take a stand on critical issues; who look to see who is smiling at them or who is frowning at them before they cast their vote. Someone once said that we have the best leadership that money can buy. There is more truth than humor in that statement." P.Graham

Magic happens

Extraordinary things happen these days: mysterious vanishings, sudden occultations and various other oddities. And the uncanny thing is that not even the Fraud Squad within the Metropolitan Police have escaped the influence of these unexplained phenomena.
I’ll give you just one example: in July this year, we sent an email to the Specialised Crime Unit in the Met to enquire about the progress of the Gaul case and discuss the opportunity of our providing additional evidence. We received no reply to this enquiry. Over the next four-month period, we sent four more emails reiterating the questions; but still no response.

Having telephoned the detective in charge of the case last month, we found out that our emails had all been lost: i.e. they had all vanished before reaching his inbox.

Consequently, we re-transmitted the correspondence (using the very same email address) and received a promise for a timely reply.
Strangely, that reply has not yet arrived. Stranger still, the detective concerned, it seems, has now … ZAP! … also vanished.

Why?

There is, probably, a technical explanation for all these bizarre occurrences – either that, or somebody up there is playing mischievously with his magic wand.

Out of sight, out of mind

Earlier this year, we published (HERE) a list with the main protagonists in the 2004 Re-opened Formal Investigation into the sinking of the trawler Gaul.

Today we can advise that some of those who were involved in the RFI, on the side of the government, have now moved to other positions, way away from their original milieu.

Lord Goldsmith, the ex-Attorney General on whose behalf the Gaul RFI was held, after ‘three months gardening leave’, has joined Debevoise & Plimpton’s, a US firm where his lordship will re-qualify as a solicitor.

Mr Nigel Meeson, the ex-Counsel for the Attorney General, is now in the Cayman Islands, employed as solicitor by Conyers Dill & Pearman.

Jo Cuningham who, alongside Mr Meeson, represented the Attorney General during the 2004 Gaul RFI has gone to the British Virgin Islands, employed by the law firm Maples and Calder.

And, finally, Mr Laurance O’Dea, solicitor for the ex-Attorney General, is deserting the Treasury Solicitors Office to take early retirement, leaving us to deal with his somewhat less voluble successors.

As far as our government is concerned, these prominent actors as well as the Gaul RFI are now out sight and out of mind.

We will, however, try to keep them all in our thoughts.

“The unspoken word never does harm”*

Further to our post of 31 October 2007, The DfT have not yet provided an answer to our question regarding the identity of those in-house technical specialists who, allegedly, advised the Department not to re-open the Gaul RFI.

And it’s been more than a month since we asked!

The head of Shipping Policy 2 appears now to be more reticent than usual, as he has recently advised that he could no longer liaise with me viva voce, but only in writing. Written communications can undoubtedly protect him better against any potentially harmful Freudian slip on his part, allowing the DfT lawyers to ponder their options first – why else would the Department employ an army of solicitors, if not for the purpose of weighing every comma in any written reply the DfT may have to produce on delicate matters such as ours? Not to mention that written communications can be more easily delayed or even mislaid.

A deep silence is therefore enveloping the Department at the moment.
Meanwhile, withdrawn to their deepest sanctum, the grey eminences of the DfT are busy designing traps which, they cheer their minds at the prospect, may ensnare the civil servant who blew the whistle on the Gaul case, and, hopefully, prevent the final showdown.

_______________________

*Lajos Kossuth

Remembrance Day

The government’s thugs

The government’s thugs = a new taxonomic group whose members are made up of more than one cell and can perform specialised functions under remote control. Raw features, eyes dulled with distrust and unfriendliness, they can be seen roaming the land, keeping watch and hissing threats. (See also our post of 01 August 2007)

(This is a snapshot of a recent sighting. Unlike many others captured on our camera, this one has not yet been properly pinned and labelled.)

‘Providing a visible and reassuring presence’ on our alleys and street corners, the thugs have been given the important mission of persuading us to abandon the Gaul case.

Unfortunately, despite all their efforts, we still wish to see it through. Besides, we have already got used to the thugs, so we can now recognize their biology and behaviour as easily as we can tell the fear and hostility of the instigating authorities.

Sinking Sequence

Following our post of 31 October 2007 in which we mentioned the DfT’s persistent ‘belief’ in the expert analysis that had been carried out during the Gaul Formal Investigation.

Once again we feel obliged to persist ourselves, by pointing to a number of additional anomalies in this ‘expert analysis’.

These anomalies relate to the 2004 RFI panel’s conclusion that the Gaul sank ‘stern first’ and hit the seabed ‘stern first’ before coming to rest in the position in which it was discovered by Norman Fenton’s survey team in 1997.

The available evidence reveals, however, that the information obtained from the MAIB underwater surveys does not actually support the conclusion of the RFI but, quite the opposite, suggests that, in fact, the vessel sank ‘bow first’ and also came into contact with the seabed ‘bow first’.

(For a more details on this point of contention, please see this linked DOCUMENT.)

Photo mosaic of Gaul wreck's outer hull superimposed on body plan
(Crown copyright)

This more likely suggestion that the Gaul sank ’bow first’ is also consistent with the scenario (put forward within our post of 16 September 2007) in which the fish loading hatches had been opened by the pressure of the air trapped inside the vessel as she was sinking rather than due to crew error, as the RFI panel chose to believe.

Once again it can be seen that the RFI panel examined the available evidence in a loose manner, trimming the edges of the jigsaw pieces so they fitted together into a distorted picture that was meant to deceive.

Interlude

The closed system

“The Department is satisfied that there is no reason to doubt the outcome of the expert analysis that led to the Re-opened Formal Investigations conclusions and consequently there is no reason to re-open the investigation,” says the message sent to us by the Department for Transport on 8 October 2007.

So, the DfT are still proclaiming their faith in the merits of the 2004 Gaul RFI which, it is no longer a secret, did not lead to anything, except injustice and frustration, driving the whole purpose of a formal investigation onto precarious ground.

“You have informed me that the technical report, related documents and information published on the following sites: http://the-trawler-gaul.blogspot.com and www.freewebs.com/inconvenientcitizen, had been viewed by technical experts within the DfT before your latest decision not to re-open the investigation was taken.
I would therefore be grateful if you could tell me who these in-house experts are.” We gently inquired the very same day.

Well, the DfT have, so far, been unable to give us the reply. They need, it seems, legal advice on how to answer the question.
Why take such precautions? We had only asked for the names of the experts involved… Is it because no in-house technical specialists have been in fact consulted? The DfT draw their technical expertise from agencies such as MCA and MAIB. These, as far as we know, have not yet been requested to advise the Department on any of the technical matters that had been raised... Is it because their advice might not be what the DfT would like to hear?

Anxious and unable to either refute our disclosures or renege the schemes of the previous administration, the DfT is therefore stuck, mindlessly repeating the same old line.

While it may first appear as bizarre, their attitude is quite explicable: the system created by our political regime cannot simply over-ride itself in order to correct the wrongs of that regime.

Inhabitants of a closed system, like the one described by the Michelson and Morley experiment, our government departments and their institutional dependants are, moreover, unable to observe the absolute actions of that system from the outside - trapped as they are within their own relativity, and so much preoccupied with self-preservation.

Making bubbles

In our post of 16 September 2007 we showed that the calculations for the pressure of the air, trapped inside the Gaul as she sank, which are contained in the MAIB report no 4/99 and were relied upon during the 2004 RFI, are incorrect.

These calculations were performed by BMT, the company which MAIB had sub-contracted to carry out this simple task on the their behalf.
Unable, perhaps, to consign the work to one of their own specialists, or even consult their encyclopaedias, or other publications such as Popular Mechanics, the MAIB decided to farm it out. Generously paid for by the taxpayer, BMT appear, nonetheless, to have got it wrong…

Anyway, when recently asked to offer his comments on the errors identified in their report, the Chief Inspector of Marine Accidents at MAIB, Mr Stephen Meyer, sent us a rather incongruous and terse reply: our emailed inquiry, he said curtly, did not provide grounds for re-opening the Gaul Investigation (?!) (His strange response reminding us of that absurdist joke with the two elephants in a bathtub; where one said “soap” and the other one said “radio”)

Well, of course our email didn’t provide such grounds: it hadn’t been intended to; it only pointed out that there was a small bit of trouble with their sums.
The rest of our technical evidence and disclosures, however, do provide the grounds - but Mr Meyer, alas, couldn’t comment on that.

Fahrenheit 451

The Rt Hon John Prescott has never been a scholar; there was no need for that and no one should hold that against him.

However, before the Office of Deputy Prime Minister was created, in the period between 1997 and 2001, as Secretary of State for Transport and Regions, he decided to transform the DETR and its executive agencies (e.g. the MCA[1]), through the hands of his newly appointed managers and disciples, and in accordance with his vision.

Installed in 1998, the new management of the MCA, promptly declared war on elitism – oh, that very notion the mere utterance of which would make John Prescott and his comrades go dizzy in the head – and set out to rejuvenate the Agency.
It was then when the MCA was purged of many of the ‘old-fashioned’ elements, which, in Mr Prescott’s worldview, were not ‘business-friendly’ enough or sufficiently attached to the New Labour cultural ideals. Old-guard civil servants, ex-RN officers and veteran technical staff within the MCA were systematically replaced with loyal and enthusiastic ‘new blood’.

It was also in following with John Prescott precepts, that, in 2002, the MCA had its technical Library destroyed.
Tomes of standards, both new and old, rare editions of technical books, ship construction plans and other hard to get shipping safety publications were declared useless and were committed to flames, skipped or otherwise disposed of. (It was no use explaining that these unique books showed how ships had been built; that the library stock contained invaluable technical references, historic records and other useful and irreplaceable information[2]. The official response was that all these materials, although never electronically published, should be easily picked up from the Internet.)

At the time of the devastation, worried MCA civil servants and technical staff could be seen running around, shirt-tails out of trousers, arms full of volumes, trying to rescue some of the valuable stock from destruction.

The little that is left today of that large deposit of maritime knowledge now probably resides only in the attics of a few MCA staff.

Legacy of the Prescott era, the room where the library once stood has since been sterilized and converted into trendy new offices, cheerful and without a past.

That was also the era, I am sad to mention, when the fate of the Gaul investigation was sealed.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------

[1] UK Maritime and Coastguard Agency
[2] Not to mention the fact that they were also a resource, which underpinned the development of contemporary maritime law.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------

***
“Janitorial work, essentially. Everything in its proper place. Quick with the kerosene! Who’s got a match!” Fahrenheit 451, Ray Bradbury

***
“We must all be alike…everyone made equal…A book is a loaded gun in the house next door. Burn it. Take the shot from the weapon. Breach man’s mind” Idem

Police Complaint

We feel we are now at liberty to publish (below) the written complaint that was submitted to the Fraud Squad of the Metropolitan Police earlier this year (as per our post of 03 April 2007).

(Names and other personal details have been removed from the version published online.)

The complaint is just an introductory part to the evidence we have made available for the authorities.

In due course, we will publish the follow-ups and other relevant information.

"Dear Sirs,

RE: The trawler Gaul tragedy: recent history, the Re-opened Formal Investigation (2004) and subsequent events

We consider that the matters presented below may be worthy of your attention:

My name is [xxxxxxxxx]...[xxxxxxxxx]...[xxxxxxxxx]

In the course of my work there [at the Maritime and Coastguard Agency], I had reason to examine a number of technical issues associated with the design and construction of the trawler Gaul (lost in 1974 with 36 deaths).

In 2002, the reason for the vessel’s loss was still very much a mystery; however, the case was to be re-opened and a Governmental Formal Investigation carried out.

On looking into this case, I noted that the design of the closing arrangements for two refuse chute openings in the hull of the vessel were of poor design and that, in certain circumstances, they could be expected to malfunction. I was also aware that, in rough weather, a malfunction in these arrangements, positioned as they were just above the waterline, could lead to flooding, capsize and the loss of the vessel.

I discussed this matter with my MCA colleagues and the relevant Inspectors from the Marine Accident Investigation Branch
(MAIB), who concurred on this subject. The MAIB subsequently agreed to add these refuse chutes (for disposal of duff and offal waste) to their extensive list of items for examination during their forthcoming underwater survey.

(Email sent by the Head of the Fishing Vessels Safety Branch in the MCA to the Directors of MCA Standards Directorate in
2002)

A detailed underwater survey of the wreck was carried out in July 2002, at which time it was found that the inner and outer closures, for both the duff and offal chutes, were in the fully open position, i.e. in rough weather there would have been nothing to prevent seawater from gaining entry into the hull of the vessel.

The MAIB informed me of these findings at that time, but also advised that I should not discuss or reveal this information to others in view of the forthcoming Re-opened Formal Investigation (RFI).

The Formal Investigation

The RFI, held under the auspices of the DPM, John Prescott, and conducted on behalf of the Attorney General, started in Hull on 13 January 2004 and closed on 27 February 2004; it then re-opened again on 8 October, for one day, to hear additional evidence. The final report of the Investigation was published on 17 December 2004.

Following the publication of the RFI’s final report, I was somewhat surprised to see that human error/negligence, on the part of the crew, had been put forward as the causal factor for this tragedy. I was also surprised to find out that only a very cursory attention had been paid to the design, construction and closing arrangements for these two hull side openings that were deemed to have been critical to the vessel’s loss.

A further examination of the final report and of the evidence that was presented during the RFI, (this is available online at http://www.fv-gaul.org.uk/) revealed a number of inconsistencies, omissions and errors, the cumulative effect of which indicated that the conclusions of the RFI were unsound.

Since that time I have carried out a significant amount of private research, which now clearly points to the fact that a miscarriage of justice has occurred, that this has happened with intent, and as the result of specific actions and inactions by those who were charged with the conduct of this Investigation. (The Investigation was carried out under the supervision of the Attorney General’s office).

In private, some of the technical staff, who had also been involved in the Gaul investigation, expressed their frustrations as to the way the RFI had been conducted and admitted that its outcome had been unsound. They, however, refrained from speaking openly against it.

Recently, we have raised a number of questions with the investigating authorities (the Attorney General’s office (Treasury Solicitor), the DfT, the MAIB and the presiding Judge); they have all been unwilling and, apparently, unable to give satisfactory answers to our concerns.

We have also raised questions in Parliament through our local MP, the answers to which (from the Transport minister) are known to be evasive, misleading and, in some instances, factually incorrect.

One of the reasons why we are bringing these matters to your attention at this moment in time is the fact that both my wife and I have been the subject of considerable harassment during the past four years and that this state of affairs is continuing (both within and without the workplace).

We have, therefore, concluded that the only way out of this situation is to bring the facts out into the open. We have realised that the reason for the harassment is, the fact that we know that the RFI was ‘rigged’ by the Government in order to arrive at a pre-determined and convenient outcome, and that we have evidence to show that this was the case.

While guiding a Formal Investigation along a narrow course towards a pre-determined conclusion may or may not be technically illegal from a procedural point of view, we perceive that obstructing justice in order to prevent interested parties from suing for lawful compensation amounts to fraud; we also consider that this is a perversion of justice, and it is our obligation to bring this matter to the attention of the relevant authorities.

The threats, harassment and intimidation that we have had to endure throughout this period are also against the law.

Harassment

[xxxxxxxxx]…[xxxxxxxxx]…[xxxxxxxxx]

The harassment we are complaining about includes various forms of offensive behaviour and intimidation: noticeable monitoring of our private and workplace communications, hassle from various government bodies, invasions of our privacy, tampering with our car, shadowing and bullying at work, stalking by unknown parties, repeated emails with distressing or bizarre content, strange phone calls and cold call visitors, various other ‘dirty tricks’ and, most worryingly for us, death threats.

Motives

We appreciate that the above contains a number of serious allegations and that it is difficult to believe that our Government would be prepared to go to such lengths on an issue such as this; however, it is suggested that this matter should be viewed in terms of the political fallout that could occur should the initial wrongdoing and subsequent cover-up in this case be revealed. We have evidence supporting these allegations and the Government knows that we have it.

It is considered that the Government’s initial motive for steering the RFI towards a finding of crew error rather than a finding of fault in the vessel’s design is based on the fact that the Government is still notionally responsible for liabilities that arise from the

UK’s shipbuilding yards that were nationalised in 19771. A design fault in the Gaul, leading to its loss, would have rendered the shipbuilders (Brooke Marine -no longer trading) and possibly the Classification Society (the organisation that certified the vessel) liable to claims for compensation from the relatives of the deceased. The sums involved could be significant: current UK legislation puts a limit on such claims at around £1.5m for each life lost.

Initially, my involvement and input into the Gaul case would have been seen as a ‘loose end’ that would need to be tidied up once the conclusions of the RFI were known (after all, as a civil servant, I am covered by the official secrets act). However, this tidying up exercise has not, as yet, led to the desired result and the scale of the cover-up has had to grow to contain the expanding scandal.

In the light of the above, we are now referring this matter to you with the hope that you will investigate the fraud and subsequent cover-up that we believe have been committed and thus help all those concerned to restore justice in this case.

Many thanks and best regards,

[xxxxxxxxx]

Contact details

[xxxxxxxxx]

The two websites mentioned below give extensive information on the technical issues associated with the loss of the Gaul, including commentary, criticism and correspondence:

www.freewebs.com/inconvenientcitizen

http://the-trawler-gaul.blogspot.com/

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

1 We have raised a parliamentary question on this particular matter (2 November 2006 ref. Brooke Marine) however we have not been able to verify whether the Government’s response to this question is correct and that it reveals the whole truth. In any case, regardless of the Government’s viewpoint it would be for the courts to decide where liability for a shipyard design error actually lay. The Classification Society (Lloyds Register) is still trading.

Non-exclusive

We were contacted today by a 'foreign journalist', curious about our complaint to the police (see the post above) and the events leading to it. He wished to obtain, he said, some sort of exclusivity in reporting 'the story'.

As we have mentioned from the beginning, we have not and we will not offer any exclusivity.
We consider such an arrangement as highly inappropriate. Our posts have been written in the public interest, free for all to see (we hope).

We do not wish to be gagged in any way.

Seventeen Techniques for Truth Suppression

"Strong, credible allegations of high-level criminal activity can bring down a government. When the government lacks an effective, fact-based defence, other techniques must be employed. The success of these techniques depends heavily upon a cooperative, compliant press and a mere token opposition party.

1. Dummy up. If it's not reported, if it's not news, it didn't happen.

2. Wax indignant. This is also known as the "How dare you?" gambit.

3. Characterize the charges as "rumours" or, better yet, "wild rumours." If, in spite of the news blackout, the public is still able to learn about the suspicious facts, it can only be through "rumours." (If they tend to believe the "rumours" it must be because they are simply "paranoid" or "hysterical.")

4. Knock down straw men. Deal only with the weakest aspects of the weakest charges. Even better, create your own straw men. Make up wild rumours (or plant false stories) and give them lead play when you appear to debunk all the charges, real and fanciful alike.

5. Call the sceptics names like "conspiracy theorist," "nutcase," "ranter," "kook," "crackpot," and, of course, "rumour monger." Be sure, too, to use heavily loaded verbs and adjectives when characterizing their charges and defending the "more reasonable" government and its defenders. You must then carefully avoid fair and open debate with any of the people you have thus maligned. For insurance, set up your own "sceptics" to shoot down.

6. Impugn motives. Attempt to marginalize the critics by suggesting strongly that they are not really interested in the truth but are simply pursuing a partisan political agenda or are out to make money (compared to over-compensated adherents to the government line who, presumably, are not).

7. Invoke authority. Here the controlled press and the sham opposition can be very useful.

8. Dismiss the charges as "old news."

9. Come half-clean. This is also known as "confession and avoidance" or "taking the limited hangout route." This way, you create the impression of candour and honesty while you admit only to relatively harmless, less-than-criminal "mistakes." This stratagem often requires the embrace of a fall-back position quite different from the one originally taken. With effective damage control, the fall-back position need only be peddled by stooge sceptics to carefully limited markets.

10. Characterize the crimes as impossibly complex and the truth as ultimately unknowable.

11. Reason backward, using the deductive method with a vengeance. With thoroughly rigorous deduction, troublesome evidence is irrelevant. (e.g. We have a completely free press. If evidence exists that the Vince Foster "suicide" note was forged, they would have reported it. They haven't reported it so there is no such evidence.) Another variation on this theme involves the likelihood of a conspiracy leaker and a press who would report the leak.

12. Require the sceptics to solve the crime completely. (E.g. If Foster was murdered, who did it and why?)

13. Change the subject. This technique includes creating and/or publicizing distractions.

14. Lightly report incriminating facts, and then make nothing of them. This is sometimes referred to as "bump and run" reporting.

15. Baldly and brazenly lie. A favourite way of doing this is to attribute the "facts" furnished the public to a plausible-sounding, but anonymous, source.

16. Expanding further on numbers 4 and 5, have your own stooges "expose" scandals and champion popular causes. Their job is to pre-empt real opponents and to play 99-yard football. A variation is to pay rich people for the job who will pretend to spend their own money.

17. Flood the Internet with agents. This is the answer to the question, "What could possibly motivate a person to spend hour upon hour on Internet news groups defending the government and/or the press and harassing genuine critics?" Don’t the authorities have defenders enough in all the newspapers, magazines, radio, and television? One would think refusing to print critical letters and screening out serious callers or dumping them from radio talk shows would be control enough, but, obviously, it is not. "

By David Martin - http://www.dcdave.com/article3/991228.html

* We have underlined the text, which describes those techniques that we feel we have already sampled during our year- long campaign to have the Gaul case objectively re-examined.

We've been here before

Following up from our posts of 5 and 9 September, and our recent correspondence with the Treasury Solicitors, we announce that we have been taken aback by the latest reply received from the TSol.

Rather than answering our questions or justifying their previous position (which is a shame because we would have loved to hear their answers), the Treasury Solicitors have decided, this time around, to abandon subterfuge, lay down their swords and wash their hands of the Gaul case, passing the responsibility for a final decision on the prospect of re-opening the Gaul investigation back to the Department for Transport.

Well, I am sure Mrs Ruth Kelly was grateful for that; after all the efforts she had made in order to avoid personal involvement, shielding herself with the bodies of various lawyers and civil servants, she is now back in the spotlight.

Unfortunately for Mrs Kelly, the duty to consider our evidence and decide on the necessity of re-opening the Gaul case does, indeed, rest with the Secretary of State for Transport. This is the law and there is no ministerial exception to it.

Debunking fallacies

(The hinged inner covers – part 1)

Over the course of the past year we have revealed a number of serious failings in the conduct and conclusions drawn by the 2004 Gaul RFI panel. Throughout this time, the DfT has, nonetheless, persistently avoided re-opening the debate on this subject and doggedly stuck to the RFI official line.

As the fallacies in their final report were being dismantled, they continued to fend off any controversy by wielding what they thought was their ‘biggest’ argument:

[Regardless of any failings in the investigative process, on the day of the loss, the crew could have closed and secured the inner covers of the duff and offal chutes and this action in itself would have saved the vessel.]

Thus, the officials argue, regardless of any failures of the RFI, the over-riding outcome of the formal investigation (that crew error had been instrumental in the vessel’s loss) is still valid and, therefore, a miscarriage of justice did not occur.

As we are going to demonstrate in our future posts, this argument, also, is fallacious in that it, too, relies on misinterpretations of known facts and on conclusions that have been drawn from incorrect or unsound premises. For instance:

1. The panel concluded that the crew had left the inner covers of the chutes open. Using images from the underwater survey of wreck, they tried to show that one of the inner covers had been tied back in the open position.
   The ligature that supposedly performed this function was clearly just an item of post-casualty debris.
   Moreover, there was evidence indicating quite the opposite –i.e. that both covers might have been closed and secured before the incident happened.
2. The panel stated that the construction of the inner covers was satisfactory, that they were watertight and that, had they been closed, the safety of the vessel would have been assured.
   
   This is not at all correct: the inner covers were neither weathertight nor watertight, they were not even supposed to be so, and, if closed, they could not have been relied upon to maintain the watertight integrity of the vessel.

The chutes had two means of protection against the ingress of water from outside: the outer non-return flaps and the inner covers.
Making a simplistic, although very befitting, analogy we can compare the system for closing the chutes to that used to seal a plastic milk bottle: the threaded plastic cap at the outside, providing the strength barrier against spillage, and the tin foil seal on the inside, meant only to stop leakage.

The Gaul RFI, in their desire to obscure the obvious design flaws of the outer flaps, concluded that, no matter the state of the flaps, had the inner covers been closed and secured, the loss of vessel would have been prevented.
This, going back to our comparison, is like saying that, no matter whether your milk bottle has its plastic cap securely screwed on or not, the tin foil underneath should be enough to prevent the milk from spilling, whatever the circumstances and however roughly you handle the bottle.