Save Our Ferries

For the past several weeks, the media Canada-wide have been headlining the compensation, benefits and pension of David Hahn, president and CEO and former member of the BC Ferry Services Board of Directors.

 Detractors, politicians and members of the media have expressed outrage, incredulity and amazement at the compensation package for the CEO, and other members of his executive team of the hybrid corporation, BC Ferry Services Inc., the not-so-private, not-so-public company created in 2003 by Premier Gordon Campbell, BCFC Board Chair David Emerson, Transportation Minister Judith Reid and Interim President and CEO of BCFC, Doug Allen. (The same Doug Allen who chaired the Board of Directors Committee when the bonus structure and pensions were enhanced). The new model unlike the Crown Corporation model actually allowed for two boards to oversee BC Ferries, along with an 'independent' Commission that was to ensure compliance with the Coastal Ferry Act and the Coastal Ferry Services Contract. The two boards were remunerated, as were the president and his executive team, to conform to a private sector model rather than linking compensation to the public sector as had previously been the case.

Fast forward to March 22, 2006 and the sinking of the Queen of the North. In the aftermath of that disaster, BCFS board minutes from June 2006 disclose that David Hahn and other members of his executive team were to be given increases in their performance bonuses for the handling of theQueen of the North disaster.

On June 7, 2006, Director Allen, chair of the Governance Human Resources Committee, reported to the board on the following matters pertaining to executive compensation that were discussed at the June 7, 2006 meeting of the committee: He noted that the committee had recommended that adjustments be made to the 2005/06 bonus plan payments for the executive group, including the corporate secretary, the executive vice-presidents, and the president and chief executive officer, as well as to the Long Term Incentive Plan 
( LTIP) payments, in order to reflect the seriousness of the incident respecting the Queen of the North.

In contrast, the settlement agreement between survivors of the sinking of the Queen of the North and BC Ferries in August, 2010, some four-and-a-half years following the incident, awarded the members of the class action a mere $141, 275.55, after HST and legal fees swallowed much of the original settlement. This all leaves us wondering where responsibility, accountability and truth lie in this tragic case -- and equally of importance, what everyone has learned from the worst maritime disaster in BC Ferries' history, a disaster that appears will have one lone individual prosecuted for its outcome?

Almost immediately following the sinking, the President of the BC Ferry and Marine Workers' Union called for a judicial or public inquiry into the incident. Others, including the provincial NDP and the International Transport Workers' Federation, did as well. The president of the union was prompted to do so for two reasons.

First, there was an important and relevant precedent for such an inquiry being called by the government of British Columbia. Glen Clark, minister responsible for BC Ferries under the NDP government called for an inquiry following the 1992 BC Ferries' incident at Departure Bay ferry terminal in Nanaimo, in which two passengers boarding the Queen of New Westminster were killed when the van they were riding in drove off the end of the loading ramp as the vessel pulled away from the berth. Acting on the request of the government, Justice Nathan Nemetz held an inquiry within weeks of the incident when memories and evidence were still intact and in the interests of the public's right and need to know what happened.

 Other proceedings conducted concurrently with the Nemetz Commission of Inquiry included:

(1) A coroner’s inquiry;
(2) An investigation by the Royal Canadian Mounted Police;
(3) A Coast Guard investigation;
(4) A Transportation and Safety Board Accident investigation;
(5) A civil suit.

(6) A BC Ferries Internal Inquiry, which was not convened until after the Nemetz Inquiry. Evidence from Nemetz was accepted and used by the BC Ferries' panel in its proceedings.

In his judgement, Nemetz  found the root cause of the incident to be safety management system failures at BC Ferry Corporation. From that inquiry, systemic failures and human errors were identified, and recommendations for changes to systems and procedures were put forward that were made binding. The union and the company were asked to review the perennial contributing factor of on-time performance and scheduling impacts on safety.The union and the corporation also agreed to a consultative safety committee structure (27.13 - Operational Safety of the Ferry System of the Collective Agreement Between BCFS and theBCFMWU) that would review and amend safety policies, practices and procedures in perpetuity. The corporation went further and began, for the first time, the long process of implementing a recognizable safety management system under the ISM Code, (the International Safety Management System Code) adopted by Canada and the international maritime community following the capsizing of the MV Herald of Free Enterprise, as well as numerous other incidents that had become an all too familiar occurrence in the international maritime community at that time.

Due primarily to financial decisions, the ISM implementation and the knowledge base associated with it dwindled, and persons directly involved with implementation left the corporation for personal, professional reasons, as well as conflicting viewpoints on the success of the implementation, and were not replaced.

In 2003, the BC Government legislated that BC Ferries would be an agency of the government responsible for its own business, including the safety of the fleet, the passengers, the crew and the environment. The ISM certification went with the assets and the shipowner (BC Ferry Services Inc.). David Hahn as president and CEO and the board of directors all became responsible for ensuring that all requirements under the Code were adhered to. Things were not all smooth sailing, even from the outset. ( Queen of Surrey Engine Room Fire) Much of the brand new executive at BC Ferries lacked knowledge and experience with the International Safety Management System and safety management systems in general, and with how they were supposed to function. It was clear from the outset of the new entity that efficiency, not safety, was intended to be the number one priority.

One of the very important processes that must be followed to comply with ISM is to conduct thorough and proper investigations into incidents to determine root causes; to make recommendations for changes to systems, policies, practices and procedures and, to put it simply, learn from mistakes rather than merely (and not so cleanly sometimes) assign blame to individuals. 

Assigning blame is easy; learning from errors, especially systemic ones, is the hard part. It's hard because it means whole systems, whole organizations, including regulators and system auditors, may be to blame rather than individuals. Vast cultural change within the organization will often be necessary.

 It has always been patently obvious, to us as well as to others in industry, that there was a complete system failure at BC Ferries that caused the sinking and subsequent deaths of the two passengers on the Queen of the North. The catastrophe was due to many things, including human factors, lack of consistent procedures, lack of training, lack of bone fide selection criteria, lack of communication, lack of adherence to regulations in a consistent manner.

 A detailed analysis can be found in the excellent Transportation Safety Board (TSB) Accident Investigation document that details the many systemic failures that prevailed on the night of March 22, 2006. There were many factors that lined up that night to conspire to create the ultimate incident.  In the accident investigation realm, it's called the Swiss Cheese effect, when all the holes in the safety management system line up just perfectly and that one great big terrible incident happens.

Read all the TSB accident Investigations into BC Ferries' incidents for a more fulsome picture of BC Ferries' safety record: the Queen of Surrey fire, the collision between the Spirit of BC and the Star Ruby pleasure craft, the grounding of the Queen of Oak Bay, the collision between the Queen of Alberniand a freighter in fog, and the  Queen of New Westminster to name but a few in whichTSB warned BC Ferries and Transport Canada repeatedly that there were serious deficiencies in their safety management system, in bridge resource management, in procedures, in training over the course of many years. And while some of these issues were addressed periodically, there appears to have been a lack of a consistent, continuous, diligent approach as per the ISM Code and the Canada Shipping Act, regardless of whether it was BC Ferry Corporation or BC Ferry Services Inc.; the Social Credit government or the NDP or Liberal governments.

If one wants to take a very broader view and look back at BC Ferries' safety record and incidents, one could go back even further to the Coast Guard inquiries that were conducted prior to marine accident investigations being mandated to the TSB; in particular the collision of the Queen of Victoria with a Russian freighter and the grounding of the Queen of Prince Rupert in Gunboat Passage -- not once, but twice. These reports provide an interesting and informative view of the longstanding and some would say dysfunctional relationship between Transport Canada both in Ottawa and on the west coast in its regulation of the the ferry operator, of Lloyd's Rgister and DNV (Der Norski Veritas) Classification Societies,  which have been largely responsible for safety auditing of the fleet, and of BC Ferries and the special status the west coast ferry fleet has enjoyed ever since its inception under the WAC Bennett Social Credit government.

PartTwo