BOW WAVE 116

Marino Edition

news and views on trade, insurance and risk

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Wavy Line	sam@wavyline.com
(c)2002 WavyLine.com	Issue No 116 11 Feb 02
Published free of charge to Readers
Editor: Sam Ignarski
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In this issue:

1. Welcome
2. P&I Renewal Story So Far
3. Insurance Echo
4. Top Australian Law Firms
5. Para-Military Taxi Tours
6. And Finally...

1. Welcome

Bow Wave in the News

The Piece on Reinventing the Baltic Exchange produced a lot of feedback and even generated a letter to the Editors in Lloyd\'s List.

Mark Holford, VP Marketing for Shipserv noted the arguments (advanced also in Bow Wave Issue 114) which mentioned \"the post maritime dot.com formula for success\" and in particular the \"on-line processes which considerably reduce the costs and delays of the back office.\"

\"It is good\", Holford writes, \"that he makes this point because there remains in the market still today a perception that e-commerce is about revolutionising the way that people do things, throwing away old relationships and spamming the world for the cheapest quote. In shipping, for those who know it, that would be a recipe for disaster. Perhaps that is why there are only five maritime e-procurement companies left.\" Sounds Right to Us.

New Readers this week include:

Melanie Taylor of the Port of Le Havre Authority
Capt. Neale Rodrigues, Marine Superintendent,now of PIL (UK) Ltd David van der Werf in Holland
Richard Rea of the Navigators
Messrs Nestor Marine
Robert G. Langenhan of Liberty International Underwriters Des Ward of nqsurvey.com
Paula Copeland at Centennial College in Toronto, Canada Ed O\'Connor of MTM Global in St .Catharines, Ontario, Canada Janet Sykes of the Baltic Exchange
Marketing Guru Richard Mabb of Mostra in London

News of Readers this Week:

Quite a celebration is in prospect for the launch of Prof. Tetley\'s website and two books in Montreal this month. These launch occasions have not been entered into rashly but seem to have something also of a commemorative flavour about them.

The site is known as \"Tetley\'s Law and Other Nonsense\" and can be seen at:

http://tetley.law.mcgill.ca/

The website has been in existence for over four years, is used extensively nationally and internationally, and has recently been revamped. It contains hundreds of pages of information including chapters of a new book to be published in the next year and a 100 page glossary of legal terms, some terms being in five languages. Also to be seen are exams and answers; law articles; international and national law glossaries; links to other important sites: texts on Canadian history and politics, on the October Crisis, 1970; on P.E. Trudeau, Mordecai Richler, Jacques Parizeau, Bernard Landry, Martin Luther King; Christmas and other quizzes, etc., etc.
and a reference to Bow Wave

The two Books being celebrated were never launched, but they were very well received by their public (better late than never):

1) Maritime Liens & Claims, 2nd Edition, 1998 (1776 pages), published by Les Éditions Yvon Blais.

2) Glossary of Maritime Law Terms, (101 pages), published by the law firm of Langlois, Gaudreau & O\'Connor.

Prof. Tetley practised law from 1952 to 1970, and was the elected member for N.D.G. in the Quebec National Assembly from 1968 to 1976. From 1970 to 1976 he was a member of the first cabinet of Robert Bourassa (as Minister of Financial Institutions).

From 1976 to the present, he has been a professor of law at McGill University. He considers his website a fourth career. He is also celebrating his 50th year as a member of the Bar .

Our Issue starts with a small progress note on the P&I renewal season, the industry from whence your editor hails. So apologies to more generalist readers for tarrying on one of the less well trodden pastures of insurance. Once a marino always a marino.

Later on we have stories of above average kidney.

Enjoy.

2. P&I Renewal Story So Far

This is the time of year when the mutual insurers of third party liabilities of shipowners, known as P&I Clubs, for whom your editor retains an unaccountable liking, in one fell swoop renew their Members\' terms of entry. On the 20th of February. And given the turmoil in marine insurance in the year 2002, it is the non-profit mutuals which are seen by many observers as the bedrocks of stability. Yet this year more questions come to mind than answers.

It is a strange story. Of the leading four Clubs, only one, the UK Club is going for growth. The others are content to increase their rates for existing Members, tend to their groves and manage their affairs. And yet rates are due to increase by 20 per cent and more. And this in an industry which simply has too many Clubs , which is destined to enjoy a period of consolidation. 12 must become 5 4 or 3 we suppose.

Peculiar, nicht wahr? And for why is the largest Club in the industry so keen to win back a share of the market it has been slowly shedding for decades?

Why do the other strong Clubs eschew a scramble for new Members at a time like this? It is almost as if new business acts has an unattractive quality for the wealthier marine mutuals. We will try to explain why in a later edition.

It is at any rate difficult to say anything very meaningful from year to year about this industry. A deal of time perforce elapses for nothing much to happen. Each renewal season there is a huffing and a puffing and all of one or two per cent of the market changes Clubs.

But the industry and the rankings within it do nonetheless change over time. And the generation of Managers which used to preside over the Clubs with a \"It\'ll see us out, any road\" ethos is going or is gone.

And what is the mutual equivalent of a capacity crunch? An amalgamation of Clubs, Club Managers or the migration of individual established Members to Clubs of a certain quality?

3. Insurance Echo

Latest up is this recently launched insurance portal which seems to have some sort of backing from the Insurance Institute of London, the IUA and LMBC. There are on-line directories available (at a price which will take some selling, we imagine) and various categories of things to read. Sign up at:

http://www.insurance-echo.com/

4. Top Australian Law Firms Named

For many years, your editor used to visit the lucky country from time to time and gradually formed quite an affection for the maritime scene there. Courtesy of Kevin Chinnery\'s on-line Lloyd\'s List DCN, we note the rankings for the top maritime law firms there:

\"Legal firm Norton White has come out top in shipping, ports and aviation in a major nationwide survey of 42 separate areas of corporate law.

Nationally, Blake Dawson Waldron is ranked No. 1 in road and rail law, while Mallesons Stephen Jaques ranks highest in international trade and business advisory law.

Legal Profiles, which is said to be the largest and most highly regarded independent review of Australian law firms, has just published its review for 2001/02.

Nationally, the top ten firms for shipping were (in order) Norton White, Phillips Fox, Freehills, Blake Dawson Waldron, Middletons, Withnell Hetherington, Murrell Stephenson, Ebsworth & Ebsworth, Clayton Utz and Minter Ellison.

Norton White was ranked No.1 in Sydney with the top firms in the other main cities being Phillips Fox (Melbourne), Murrell Stephenson (Brisbane), Minter Ellison
(Adelaide and Canberra) and Clayton Utz (Perth and Darwin).\"

If you like keeping in touch with the shipping and transport scene down under, there is, in our view, no better place to go than:

http://www.lloydslistdcn.com.au/

5. Para-Military Taxi Tours

Our Special Correspondent for Ireland has sent in a reference to this entrepreneurial firm of taxi owners who are offering tours around the sectarian high spots of Northern Ireland-- for a small fee, like. The Hackney Carriage Scene in the Province has unusual qualities and we understand there is sometimes a paramilitary quality to the industry which is peculiar to the place.

When you have delighted in the joys of An Corta Mor and the pictorial art of 2nd Batt UFF, you can progress north to the Giant\'s Causeway.

Check out the tours on offer at:

http://www.tobbtt.com/

6. And Finally...

Many thanks to Captain Trevor Bailey for these zen-like thoughts:

1. Do not walk behind me, for I may not lead. Do not walk ahead of me, for I may not follow. Do not walk beside me, either. Just leave me the hell alone.

2. The journey of a thousand miles begins with a broken fan belt and a leaky tyre.

3. It\'s always darkest before dawn. So if you\'re going to steal your neighbour\'s newspaper, that\'s the time to do it.

4. Sex is like air. It\'s not important unless you aren\'t getting any.

5. Don\'t be irreplaceable. If you can\'t be replaced, you can\'t be promoted.

6. No one is listening until you fart.

7. Always remember you\'re unique. Just like everyone else.

8. Never test the depth of the water with both feet.

9. If you think nobody cares if you\'re alive, try missing a couple of car payments.

10. Before you criticise someone, you should walk a mile in their shoes. That way, when you criticise them, you\'re a mile away and you have their shoes.

11. If at first you don\'t succeed, skydiving is not for you.

12. Give a man a fish and he will eat for a day. Teach him how to fish and he will sit in a boat and drink beer all day.

13. If you lend someone £20 and never see that person again, it was probably worth it.

14. If you tell the truth, you don\'t have to remember anything.

15. Some days you are the bug, some days you are the windshield.

16. Don\'t worry, it only seems kinky the first time.

17. Good judgement comes from experience. Experience comes from bad judgement.

18. The quickest way to double your money is to fold it in half and put it back in your pocket.

19. A closed mouth gathers no foot.

20. Duct tape is like the Force. It has a light side a dark side, and it holds the universe together.

21. There are two theories to arguing with women. Neither one works.

22. Generally speaking, you aren\'t learning much when your lips are moving.

23. Experience is something you don\'t get until just after you need it.

24. Never miss a good chance to shut up.

25. We are born naked, wet, and hungry, and get slapped on our ass ... then things get worse.

BOW WAVE is published each week to around 6725 readers in the transport, insurance, shipping and finance industries.

Thanks for reading BOW WAVE