Board says oil wharf safe

Press, 18 November 1982, Page 6

Board says oil wharf safe

Whether the present Lyttelton oil wharf was safe and suitable for liquid petroleum Ss vessels was the issue, a mmission of Inquiry heard yesterday. That the wharf was safe and suitable was the Lyttelton Harbour Board’s case, said counsel for the board, Mr P. G. S. Penlington, Q.C., in making final submissions.

The board’s decision to grant Liquigas, Ltd, permission to use the wharf was proper, and was subsequently justified by evidence at the inquiry, he said. Critics of the board’s decision alleged that it was based on expediency rather than on safety, but that was wrong. “At all times safety has been the board’s paramount consideration,” Mr Penlington said.

The board was justified in rejecting the advice of its Harbourmaster, Captain J. A. Balbour, who opposed using the oil wharf. The board was entitled to prefer an opposite view supplied by Captain Champion, a former harbourmaster with extensive nautical experience. Captain Champion’s opinion was supported by a

report by A. D. Little, Ltd, an American consultancy firm, that had advised on similar projects elsewhere.

“The board was entitled to give more weight to that report than to that of its Harbourmaster,” Mr Penlington said. Complaints by the pilots and Harbour Board Employees’ Union about a lack of consultation were groundless. The pilots’ views were known to the board through the Harbourmaster, who was the accepted spokesman.

Members of the union attended board meetings as observers when L.P.G. was discussed. Notwithstanding the union's knowledge of the board’s discussions there was no request for discussions between the union and the board, Mr Penlington said.

Opponents of using the oil wharf contended there was an unacceptable risk of collision between a ship manoeuvring within the inner harbour and an L.P.G. vessel at the wharf. The pilots were behind this contention; other opponents had adopted their case, which

was “overstated,” Mr Penlington said. “They put forward certain situations as difficulties which they efficiently handle now,” he said. They disregarded proposed safety measures.

“When the epithets used by the experts are assembled together — ‘a non-creditable event,’ an ‘extremely remote possibility,’ a ‘negligible risk,’ an ‘exceedingly low risk’ — the commission can then conclude that the oil wharf can be declared safe from the point of view of a ship collision.” The alternative site favoured by opponents was at the Naval Point reclamation, said Mr Penlington. The board contended that that site offered no advantage in terms of safety and suitability. “Rather, the Naval Point reclamation site and the oil wharf are on a par,” he said, and cited the evidence of three witnesses — Captain Laws, Mr Holmes, and Dr Drake.

In ending his 161-page submission, Mr Penlington said the proposed L.P.G. plan had aroused opposition that had sometimes been expressed

with more emotion than substance. The board was mindful of its duty to provide a safe and efficient port, and was correct in its decision to allow use of the oil wharf “provided that it was safe.”

The evidence had shown it was safe, and so it should receive the commission’s recommendation, he said. The oil wharf was earlier called “expedient but demonstrably unsafe” by counsel for Lyttelton Borough Council, Mr D. M. Palmer. In making final submissions, Mr Palmer said that Liquigas had failed properly to investigate alternatives. This was in spite of its having a moral duty, with the Lyttelton Harbour Board, to find a safe site.

During the hearing the Naval Point site had emerged as an alternative. The council submitted that a new oil and L.P.G. wharf be built there to avoid risk. The Harbour Board had quoted the estimated $1.5 million cost of a skeletal wharf «t Naval Point 'as a reason for not building at the site. The board was “putting its price on the lives of those who might die if (the oil

wharf) is not shifted," Mr Palmer said.

A delay of three years to build the wharf at Naval Point was “not serious for Canterbury or the country as a whole — at worst it will be inconvenient to Liquigas.” The board had development plans to move the oil wharf to Naval Point. They should be accelerated for Lyttelton residents’ safety, Mr Palmer said.

Polls of Lyttelton residents had shown that 80 per cent were opposed to the Liquigas proposal. “These people perceive an unwanted risk,” Mr Palmer said. “For this reason they are likely to have their health affected to some degree if the proposal proceeds.”

Compared with the $2O million cost of the Christchurch installation, $1.5 million was not unreasonable to reduce the risk. “A refusal to move the ship to the outer harbour can only increase the residents’ perception that their quality of life is being sacrificed to commercial and political expediency,” Mr Palmer said. Final submissions will continue today.