On Monday the 5^th of February, the Annual UK Chamber of Shipping 2018 Dinner, was held in London and attended by Clyde Marine Recruitments, Managing Director, Ian Livingstone as a guest of Serco Northlink Ferries Ltd.

The Dinner is the premier event in the shipping calendar and is an opportunity to network and celebrate the industries latest achievements.

This year HRH Prince William, the Duke of Cambridge, delivered a key note speech in which he urges the shipping community to help end the transport of illegal wildlife products.

Large-scale seizures of illegal ivory are at record highs and poaching of rhino and elephants is at the worst level seen for 25 years – but the shipping industry can play a part in ending the illicit trade of wildlife and wildlife products, HRH Prince William, The Duke of Cambridge, said in his address.

“The nub of my argument is that ultimately I believe that tackling the illegal trade in wildlife is in your interests as an industry,” the Duke said. “The trade undermines security; it fuels organised crime and it robs developing countries of natural resource that will contribute to their future prosperity.”

The Duke is President of United for Wildlife, a coalition of leading wildlife charities. United for Wildlife set up the Transport Taskforce to engage with the transport industry to save protected species from illegal trade.

The UK Chamber of Shipping was among the first signatories to United For Wildlife’s Buckingham Palace Declaration, which forms as action plan to strengthen defences against trafficking.

The Secretary of State for Transport, Chris Grayling also gave a speech which contributed to Maritime 2050, a “radical” vision that will support and propel that nation’s maritime industry well into the future.

“We need a clear path for the future, we need a strong partnership between this industry and government – and we’re calling is Maritime 2050,” he said of the concept, which was launched in September at London International Shipping Week.

“Maritime 2050 is going to be a blueprint that will harness our strengths as a nation, that will help us understand how we reach our full potential, and how we demonstrate our ambition to be a world maritime leader,” Grayling said. “This is the opportunity for us to position the industry to meet the challenges ahead, and to create a sustainable long-term future for UK maritime.”

Lastly Dr Grahame Henderson, President of the UK Chamber, used his speech at the Annual Dinner to launch HiLo, a predictive modelling tool for accident prevention in shipping.

“Our shipping industry has a fatal accident rate twenty time that of the average British worker and five times that of construction. Simply put, that is unacceptable. And it needs action – now,” Dr Henderson said in his speech. “And that means all of us, as leaders in the shipping industry, working together – working together as one global shipping team.”

The new initiative aims to prevent ‘high-impact’ events like explosions, collisions and groundings by recording the frequent low-level incidents that are pre-cursors to major incidents – hence the name HiLo.

Attendees of this years Annual Dinner raised £7,660 for the Seafarers’ Hospital Society (SHS), the President’s nominated charity, at the event.

Among other initiatives, the SHS has acted to tackle mental health issues at sea. Over a year ago, the charity commissioned the online service the Big White Wall (BWW) to fill what it perceives as a gap in the support that is available currently.

The BWW is an online mental heal and well-being service that is manned by mental health professionals and offers self-help programmes and one-to-one counselling.