1068 All England Law Reports [1987] 3 AIlER Coltman and another v Bibby Tankers Ltd The Derbyshire HOUSE OF LORDS LORD KEITH OF KINKEL, LORD ROSKILL, LORD GRIFFITHS, LORD OLIVER OF AYLMERTON AND LORD GOFF OF CHIEVELEY 26, 27 OCTOBER, 3 DECEMBER 1987 Employment — Liability of employer — Defective equipment — Ship — Whether ‘equipment' including ship - Employer’s Liability (Defective Equipment) Act 1969, s 1(1\3)- In September 1980 a 90,000 ton bulk carrier owned by the defendants sank off the coast of Japan with the loss ofall hands. The plaintifls, who were the personal representatives ofa member of the crew, brought an action against the defendants alleging that the ship was unseaworthy because of defects in the hull and claiming damages on the ground, inter alia, that the crew member's death was caused in the course of his employment in consequence of defects in equipment, namely the ship, provided by the defendants. Under s 1* of the Employer’s Liability (Defective Equipment) Act 1969, where an employee suffered personal injury or loss of life in the course of his employment in consequence of a defect in equipment provided by his employer for the purposes of the employer's business, the injury or loss of life was deemed to be atributable to negligence on the part of the employer. By s 1(3) of the 1969 Act ‘equipment’ was defined as including ‘any plancand machinery, vehicle, aircraft and clothing’. The question whether the ship was ‘equipment’ provided by the defendants for the purposes of their business was tried as a preliminary issue. The judge held that it was. The defendants appealed to the Court of Appeal, which allowed the appeal on the ground that the ship was not ‘equipment’ provided by the defendants. The plaintiffs appealed to the House of Lords, Held — A ship provided by its owner for the purposes of his business was ‘equipment’ for the purpose of s 1(1) of the 1969 Act, regardless of its size. Accordingly, where a seaman suffered personal injury or loss of life in consequence of the unseaworthiness of a ship, its owner was liable in negligence for that injury or loss of life (see p 1069 d g h, p 1072 cd to}, p 1073 abdh, p 1074.d toj and p 1075 gh, post) Decision of the Court of Appeal [1987] 1 All ER 932 reversed. Notes For employers’ liability for defective equipment, see 16 Halsbury’s Laws (4th edn) para 718, and for cases on the subject, see 20 Digest (Reissue) 490-494, 511-514, 3844-3864, 3965-3991. For the Employer's Liability (Defective Equipment) Act 1969, s 1, see 16 Halsbury’s Statutes (qth edn) 180. Cases referred to in opinions Davie v New Merton Board Mills Ltd [1959] 1 All ER 346, [1959] AC 604, [1959] 2 WLR 331, HL. Munby v Furlong (Inspector of Taxes) [1977] 2 All ER 953, [1977] Ch 359, [1977] 3 WLR 270, CA, Yarmouth v France (1887) 19 QBD 647, DC; on appeal (1888) 4 TLR 561, CA. Appeal ‘The plaintiffs, Eugenia Margaret Coltman and Alisa Elizabeth Martin, the personal a Section 1, so far as material is set out at p 1070 j to p 1071 ¢, post® HL Coltman v Bibby Tankers Ltd (Lord Keith) 1069 representatives of Leo Thomas Mackenzie Coltman deceased, appealed with the leave of the Court of Appeal against the decision of that court (O'Connor and Glidewell LJ, Lloyd LJ dissenting) ((1987] 1 All ER 932, [1987] 2 WLR 1098) on 27 January 1987 allowing the appeal by the defendants, Bibby Tankers Ltd, the owners of the ore/bulk/oil carrier Derbyshire on which the deceased was employed at the time of his death, against the judgment of Sheen J ([1986] 2 All ER 65, [1986] 1 WLR 751) given in the Admiralty Court of the Queen’s Bench Division on 14 March 1986, whereby he determined, on the trial of a preliminary issue in an action brought by the plaintiffs against the defendants, that the vessel was ‘equipment’ provided by the defendants within s 1 of the Employer's Liability (Defective Equipment) Act 1969. The facts are set out in the opinion of Lord Oliver. Geoffrey Brice QC and Belinda Bucknall for the plaintiffs. Kenneth Rokison QC and Robin Hay for the defendants. Their Lordships took time for consideration. 3 December. The following opinions were delivered. LORD KEITH OF KINKEL. My Lords, | have had the benefit of considering in draft the spech o be delivered by my noble and learned friend Lord Oliver. agree with it and for the reasons he gives would therefore allow the appeal and restore the declaration of Sheen J. LORD ROSKILL. My Lords, I must confess that I have found the problem of construction to which this appeal gives rise more difficult than have your Lordships. The marked difference of opinion in the courts below between O'Connor and Glidewell LI} on the one hand and Lloyd LJ and Sheen J on the other shows how difficult the problem is, For most of the argument I was disposed to share the views of the majority in the Court of Appeal because | found it difficult to accept that if Parliament in enacting the Employer's Liability (Defective Equipment) Act 1969 had intended that Act to embrace merchant ships in the word ‘equipment’ in s 1(1\(a) that word would have been defined ins 1(3) ina manner which includes vehicles and aircraft but does not include merchant ships. But I recognise the strength of the submission that if the main engines of merchant shipsare included in the definition, for they are clearly machinery, it is difficult to deduce any rational reason for excluding the hulls of such ships. Moreover, the derricks and winches of a merchant ship must surely be ‘equipment’ within the ordinary meaning of that word irrespective of the definition in s 1(3). Ultimately, therefore, I have found the reasoning in the speech of my noble and learned friend Lord Oliver, which I have had the benefit of reading in advance, compelling. I therefore agree that the appeal must be allowed and the question answered in the same sense as that in which it was answered by Lloyd LJ and Sheen J. LORD GRIFFITHS. My Lords, I have had the advantage of reading in advance the speech of my noble and learned friend Lord Oliver, and I agree that for the reasons he gives the appeal must be allowed and the question answered in the same sense as that in which it was answered by Lloyd LJ and Sheen J. LORD OLIVER OF AYLMERTON. My Lords, the appellants in this appeal (the plaintiffs) are the personal representatives of Leo Thomas Mackenzie Coltman deceased who was, atthe date of his death, employed by the respondent company (the defendants) as third engineer aboard the Derbyshire. The Derbyshire was a vessel of some 90,000 tons which sank off the coast of Japan on 9 September 1980 with the loss of all hands while on a voyage from Canada to Japan with a cargo of iron ore. On 5 February 19821070 All England Law Reports [1987] 3 AILER the plaintiffs commenced proceedings in the Admiralty Court claiming damages under the Law Reform (Miscellaneous Provisions) Act 1934 and the Fatal Accidents Act 1976 alleging that the sinking of the vessel and the death of the deceased had been caused by the negligence of the defendants. The particulars of negligence included allegations of defective construction and design of the vessel rendering her unseaworthy. Paragraphs 7 and 8 of the statement of claim contain a plea that the defects, which are said to be attributable wholly or in part to fault on the part of the manufacturers of the vessel, were defects in ‘equipment’ provided by the defendants for the purposes of their business within the meaning of the Employer's Liability (Defective Equipment) Act 1969 and were thus deemed to be attributable to the negligence of the defendants. The defendants by their defence denied that the vessel constituted ‘equipment’ within the meaning of that Act. Accordingly, on 13 February 1986 the Admiralty registrar ordered by consent that there be determined as a preliminary point the question whether the vessel was ‘equipment’ provided by the defendants within the meaning of s 1 of the 1969 Act. On the trial of the preliminary point on 14 March 1986 Sheen J ([1986] 2. All ER 65, [1986] 1 WLR 751) answered the question in the affirmative but on 27 January 1987 the Court of Appeal by a majority (Lloyd LJ dissenting) ((1987] 1 All ER 932, [1987] 2 WLR 1098) allowed an appeal by the defendants, declaring that the vessel was not ‘equipment’ provided by the defendants within the meaning of the Act and gave leave to appeal to your Lordships’ House. My Lords, it is common ground that the 1969 Act was introduced with a view to rectifying what was felt to be the possible hardship to an employee resulting from the decision of this House in Davie v New Merton Board Mills Ltd [1959] 1 All ER 346, [1959] AC 604, In that case an employee was injured by a defective drift supplied to him by his employers for the purpose of his work. The defect resulted from a fault in manufacture but the article had been purchased by the employers without knowledge of the defect from a reputable supplier and without any negligence on their part. It was held that the employers’ duty was only to take reasonable care to provide a reasonably safe tool and that that duty had been discharged by purchasing from a reputable source an article whose latent defect they had no means of discovering. Thus the action against them failed although judgment was recovered against the manufacturer. Clearly this opened the door to the possibility that an employee required to work with, on or in equipment furnished by his employer and injured as a result of some negligent failure in design or manufacture might find himself without remedy in a case where the manufacturer and the employer were, to use the words of Viscount Simonds, ‘divided in time and space by decades and continents’ so that the person actually responsible was no longer traceable or, perhaps, was insolvent or had ceased to carry on business (see [1959] 1 AIT ER 3.46 at 351, [1959] AC 604 at 620-621). Parliament accordingly met this by imposing on employers a vicarious liability and providing, in a case where injury was due to a defect caused by the fault of the third party, that the employer should, regardless of his own conduct, be liable to his employee as if he had been responsible for the defect, leaving it to him to pursue against the third party such remedies as he might have whether original or by way of contribution. The purpose of the Act, as set out in the long title, is— ‘to make further provision with respect to the liability of an employer for injury to his employee which is attributable to any defect in equipment provided by the employer for the purposes of the employer's business; and for purposes connected with che matter aforesaid.” The relevant provisions of the Act, for present purposes, are contained in s 1(1) and (3) and areas follows: ‘(1) Where after the commencement of this Act—(a) an employee suffers personal injury in the course of his employment in consequence of a defect in equipmentHL Coltman v Bibby Tankers Ltd (Lord Oliver) 1071 provided by his employer for the purposes of the employer's business; and (b) the defect is attributable wholly or partly to the fault of a third party (whether identified or not), the injury shall be deemed to be also attributable to negligence on the part of the employer (whether or not he is liable in respect of the injury apart from this subsection), but without prejudice to the law relating to contributory negligence and to any remedy by way of contribution or in contract or otherwise which is available to the employer in respect of the injury. (3) In this section—“business” includes the activities carried on by any public body; “ ployee” means a person who is employed by another person under a contract of service or apprenticeship and is so employed for the purposes of a business carried on by that other person, and “employer” shall be construed accordingly; “equipment” includes any plant and machinery, vehicle, aircraft and clothing; “fault” means negligence, breach of statutory duty or other act or omission. which gives rise to liability in tort in England and Wales or which is wrongful and gives rise to liability in damages in Scotland; and “personal injury” includes loss of life, any impairment of a person's physical or mental condition and any disease.’ My Lords, if sub-s (1) stood alone and without such assistance as is provided by sub-s (3), I would not, for my part, have encountered any difficulty in concluding that, in the context of this Act, a ship was part of the ‘equipment’ of the business of a shipowner. In the Court of Appeal, O'Connor LJ expressed the view that the word in its natural meaning denoted something ancillary to something else (see [1987] 1 All ER 932 at 934, [1987] 2 WLR 1098 at 1100) and an echo of this is to be found in the judgment of Glidewell LJ. Thus both Lords Justices would, I think, regard machinery attached to a ship as ‘equipment’, because it would be ancillary to the main object, the vessel, but both regarded. the word as inappropriate to describe the vessel itself. I do not doubr that the word is frequently and quite properly used to describe the appurtenances of some larger entity, but I can see no reason either in logic or as a matter of language why its use should be so confined, Indeed, there is nothing in the entry in the Oxford English Dictionary quoted by O'Connor LJ which necessarily imports that ‘equipment is restricted to parts of a larger whole. The meaning is given as ‘Anything used in equipping; furniture; outfit; warlike apparatus; necessaries for an expedition or voyage’. Moreover, your Lordships are concerned not with the meaning of ‘equipment’ simpliciter but of the composite phrase ‘equipment provided by his employer for the purposes of the employer's business’. Speaking for myself, I can think of no more essential equipment for the setting up and carrying on of the business of a shipowner than the ship or ships with which the business is carried on. This involves, in my judgment, no misuse of language. As Lloyd LJ observed in his dissenting judgment in the Court of Appeal, one would talk naturally of a fleet being ‘equipped’ with battleships, cruisers and destroyers or of the ‘equipment’ of an expedition as including supply ships (see [1987] 1 All ER 932. at 936,[1987]2 WLR 1098 at 1104). In my judgment, a shipowner's fleet of ships is properly described as the equipment of his business. They are, in truth, the tools of his trade and I can see no ground for treating the word ‘equipment’ in s 1(1)(a) (leaving aside for the moment the more difficult questions posed by sub-s (3)) as excluding this particular type of chattel as opposed to other articles, of whatever size or construction, employed by a trader in carrying on his trade. It has been submitted on behalf of the defendants that the word derives a more restricted flavour from its juxtaposition with the word ‘provided’ and that that word imports the notion of something provided to the employee for use in the course of his work and is therefore more appropriate to the type of small tool provided to the appellant in Davie v New Merton Board Mills Ltd. There is, however, no context from which this can properly be deduced; indeed the extended definition in sub-s (3) leads to a precisely contrary conclusion, and I can see no reason for reading the word ‘provided’ in anything other than its normal signification of ‘furnished’.1072 All England Law Reports [1987] 3 AILER Then it is said that ‘equipment is to be distinguished from the factory or workplace in which working tools or machinery are provided or to which they are affixed and that a ship, or, certainly, an ocean-going vessel of the size of the Derbyshire, is akin to a factory in the sense that it provided the accommodation within which the employee does his work. While, therefore, it is accepted that the various mechanical contrivances which are installed in or affixed to a vessel are properly described as equipment, the ship itself, taken as a whole, is, it is argued, not ‘equipment’ because it constitutes the employee's ‘workplace’. It is, of course, true that the provisions of the Occupiers’ Liability Act 1957 apply to a ship as they do to real property, but they equally apply in appropriate circumstances, to a vehicle or an aeroplane, so that nothing can, | think, turn on this. It isalso true that it is inherent in the nature of a vessel that those whose task it is to navigate it are accommodated within it for the purposes of their employment. But here, as it seems to me, any analogy with real estate ends, No one, I venture to think, would regard the power-boat provided for the purpose of a water-skiing school or a pleasure launch on the River Thames as being in the slightest degree akin to real estate or as being anything other than a chattel employed in a business. Such a vessel would, in my judgment, be comprehended in the term ‘equipment of the business’ even in the most everyday use of language and I can see no justification for excluding from it some category of vessel merely by reason of its size and of its necessarily providing accommodation for the crew who are required to be on board in order to operate it for the proper carrying on of the business of carrying cargo from one part of the world to another. It is, however, argued that s 1(1) does not stand alone. Tt has co be read inthe context of an Act which also contains s 1(3) and it is this which, in my judgment, constitutes the strongest argument for the defendants. Here, it is said, is a specific definition of ‘equipment’ which goes out of its way to include plant and machinery, vehicles and aircraft arid clothing. Is it conceivable, it is asked, that the draftsman of the statute, who evidently regarded himself as indicating, in sub-s (3), particular articles which might possibly not be thought of as ordinarily embraced in the phrase ‘equipment provided . .. for the purposes of . . . business’, should have specifically included vehicles and aircraft but should have omitted any reference to vessels if such omission were not intentional? Thus, it is argued, if vessels were omitted deliberately from the expanded or clarifying definition in sub-s (3) this demonstrates that the word is used in sub-s (1)(a) in a more restricted sense. My Lords, I have found myself unable to accept this approach to the problem of construction. To begin with, it is quite clear, as was pointed out by Lloyd LJ ((1987] r AILER 932. at 937, [1987] 2 WLR 1098 at 1104), that the word ‘includes’ in sub- s (3) cannot be construed as ‘means and includes’ so as to confine that which is embraced in the word ‘equipment’ to the exemplars there specified. Granted that there may be circumstances in which an inclusive definition of this sort can have a restrictive effect, that cannot, in my judgment, possibly apply in che case of this statute. Here, where the draftsman intends a restricted meaning, he makes it quite clear. One has only to contrast. the definitions of ‘business’, ‘equipment’ and ‘personal injury’, all of which are by reference to what is included, with those of ‘employee’ and ‘fault’, where the Act makes it clear that there is to be a single exclusive meaning for the purposes of the Act. Subsection (3) cannot, therefore, be used to cut down the meaning of the word ‘equipment’ as it is used in sub-s (1). It must have been inserted in the statute either for the purpose of enlarging the word by including in its articles which would not otherwise fall within it in its ordinary signification or it must have been inserted for clarification and the avoidance of doubt. For my part, I agree with Lloyd LJ that the definition is a clarifying and not an enlarging one (see [1987] 1 All ER 932, [1987] 2 WLR 1098 at 1105). Why the draftsman felt it necessary to clarify in this way is a matter for speculation Quite clearly, for instance, some ‘plant and machinery’ would be properly ribed as ‘equipment’ even in the most ordinary use of the term and the purpose of the express inclusion of plant and machinery can, I think, only have been to make it clear that every type of plant and machinery is to be regarded as equipment within the ~° HL Coltman v Bibby Tankers Ltd (Lord Oliver) 1073 meaning of the 1969 Act. The key word in the definition is the word ‘any’ and it underlines, in my judgment, what I would in any event have supposed to be the case, having regard to the purpose of the Act, that is to say that it should be widely construed so as to embrace every article of whatever kind furnished by the employer for the purposes of his business. Thus it is not just particular plant and machinery or vehicles (for instance, a combine harvester) or particular types of aircraft (for instance, a crop- spraying aeroplane) which are to be regarded as ‘equipment’ but plant and machinery, vehicles, aircraft and clothing of all types and sizes subject only to the limitation that they are provided for the purposes of te employer's business. It is certainly curious that, having resolved to refer specifically to means of transport, the draftsman should have omitted to refer in terms to water transport. Indeed, it is difficult to see why, after the express inclusion of ‘plant and machinery’, it was thought necessary to refer to any further examples. The word ‘plant’ is itself one of the widest import and is apt to embrace anything from a wharfinger’s cart-horse (see Yarmouth v France (1887) 19 QBD 647) toa lawyer's textbook (see Munby v Furlong (Inspector of Taxes) [1977]2 All ER 953, [1977]Ch 359). ‘Plant and machinery’ is even wider and had at the date of the passing of the Act a well-recognised meaning to those familiar with taxing statutes. In the ordinary way, therefore, had it not been for the express reference to vehicles and aircraft, | would, in any event, have been disposed to regard a ship as something properly embraced in the phrase ‘plant and machinery’; se, for instance, $ 31 of the Capital Allowances Act 1968, where new ships are specifically referred to and are treated as a special type of plant and machinery for the purposes of initial allowances. However, the express reference to vehicles and aircraft, while it indicates that the word ‘equipment ’is to be construed in its widest sense (a conclusion reinforced by the inclusion also of ‘clothing’), does seem to indicate at least a doubt in the draftsman’s mind whether every type of vehicle or aircraft had been embraced in what had gone before and highlights the omission of any express reference to water-borne means of transport, for if the draftsman considered that some or all of the possible land-borne or airborne means of locomotion might not properly be described as plant and machinery’ it seems curious that he did not entertain at least equal doubt about water-borne craft. It has been suggested that a ship may properly be described as a water-borne vehicle and reference has been made to the Hovercraft Act 1968 in which a hovercraft is defined as a ‘vehicle ... designed to be supported ... by air expelled from the vehicle...’ (see s 4(1)). It would, it is submitted, be absurd that a hovercraft should be a vehicle for the purpose of the definition and that a water-borne craft of commensurate size and purpose should not be. I find myself, however, unpersuaded by the transposition into this Act ofa definition. from a quite different statute. The juxtaposition of ‘vehicle’ and ‘aircraft’ demonstrates, I think, that ‘vehicle’ is used in this Act as referring specifically to a land-borne means of transport. It must, in the light of this, be at least doubtful whether, in the context of this Act, the expression ‘plant and machinery’ is properly to be construed as including ships, and Iam, for my part, content to approach the problem on the footing that it is not. The omission is certainly curious but I find myself entirely unpersuaded that there can be deduced from it an intention to cut down the very wide meaning of ‘equipment’ in sub- 5(1) which is indicated both by the legislative purpose of the statute and by the width of the clarifying definition. Various explanations have been suggested for what it is submitted was a deliberate omission. It is said, for instance, that having regard to the provisions of's 458 of the Merchant Shipping Act 1894 ship may have been deliberately “omitted because of a perceived possible conflict between liability of the shipowner under that section (which imposes only an obligation of reasonable care to ensure seaworthiness) and the vicarious liability imposed by the 1969 Act. It is also submitted that there could be difficulty in reconciling that vicarious liability with the limitation of a shipowner’s liability for injury or loss of life under s 503 of the 1894 Act in the absence of actual privity or fault. Again, it is said that to apply the provisions of the 1969 Act to a ship would give rise to problems of conflict of laws in cases where injury was caused on ships1074 All England Law Reports [1987] 3 AIIER under foreign flags or where it occurred on the high seas or in a foreign port, difficulty, however, which would equally arise in the case of an aircraft. These suggested difficulties are to my mind more illusory than real and, in so far as they exist at all, constitute a quite insufficient reason for imposing on the wide words of the statute an unexpressed limitation which would produce some quite extraordinary anomalies. Whatever may be embraced in the expression ‘plant and machinery’ it quite clearly includes any machinery installed in or affixed to a ship in the absence of some compelling context to the contrary; and there is no context whatever in this Act for reading the expression as excluding maritime machinery from ‘any’ plant and machinery. Unless, therefore, one is to read the Act as if it contained some unexpressed limitation excluding from its operation plant or machinery which comes to be installed in a ship, the exclusion from the definition of ‘equipment’ of a ship itself produces the absurd position that the employer is liable for injury caused by defective machinery on or in the ship but not for injury caused by anything which can properly be described as constituting the ship itself, ie the hull or a part of the hull. This at once raises almost insoluble problems of demarcation between those constituent pars of the ship which may properly be described as ‘plant’ or ‘machinery’ and those parts which are properly to be described as the hull or parts of the hull. There simply is no context in the Act which enables one to read ‘equipment’ as including the ship's winches, derricks, generators, pumps, engine-room plant, steering gear and so on, but as excluding the structure of the ship itself. The alternative approach of treating all ships and all their gear machinery and accoutrements as sub silentio excluded from the operation of the Act raises, to my mind, equal difficulty. It seems to me almost unarguable that ‘equipment’ does not include at least some vessels. The example ofa edger, for instance, was suggested by Lloyd Le [r987] AILER 932 938, [1987] 2 WLR 1098 at 1105) and it is not difficult to think of other examples of waterborne craft which would esl be propery syed busines equipment”. Business includes, by definition, the operations of a public body. The customs eutter, the fre- tender or the Trinity House launch, would, I should have thought, be quite clearly ‘equipment’ of the operations for which they were provided. If, then, some ships are equipment, where is the line to be drawn? It cannot, in my judgment, be drawn simply by reference to size as the majority of the Court of Appeal appear to have concluded. There is no logic in such a criterion nor any functional difference between vessels of different types which enables a line to be sensibly drawn. The purpose of the Act was manifestly to saddle the employer with liability for defective plant of every sort with which the employee is compelled to work in the course of his employment and I can see no ground for excluding particular types of chattel merely on the ground of their size or the element on which they are designed to operate. Indeed, the express inclusion of all vehicles and all aircraft militates strongly against any such distinction. Like Lloyd LJ, I am impressed both by the width of the words used by the legislature and by the legislative purpose behind the statute and I am driven to the same conclusion that he reached. T would allow the appeal and answer the question raised on the preliminary issue in the same sense as it was answered by Sheen J. LORD GOFF OF CHIEVELEY. My Lords, I am entirely in agreement with my noble and learned friend Lord Oliver, that, for the reasons he gives, a ship may form part of the ‘equipment’ of the business of a shipowner, on the natural and ordinary meaning of that word. Accordingly, if the word ‘equipment’ were not defined in the Employer's Liability (Defective Equipment) Act 1969, I would have no difficulty in deciding the present case in favour of the plaintiffs. The real difficulty in the case, as it seems to me, arises from the fact that the word ‘equipment’ is defined in s 1(3) of the 1969 Act, and that the definition expressly includes any vehicle and aircraft, but makes no mention of ships or vessels. This fact provided the basis for the powerful submission advanced on behalf of the defendants that Parliament could not, in these circumstances, have> ° a ° HL Coltman v Bibby Tankers Ltd (Lord Goff) 1075 inadvisedly excluded ships or vessels from the definition and must therefore have intended, for some reason, to exclude them. Thave struggled to discover any rational basis for such a deliberate exclusion. The only possible basis which has occurred to me is as follows, It is, I understand, accepted that, in respect of operations on land, the1969 Act only provides protection for the employee in respect of defects in equipment provided by the employer on the premises, but provides no protection in respect of defects in the premises themselves. It might therefore have been thought that, in respect of operations at sea, a similar distinction should be drawn between defects in equipment provided by the employer on the relevant ship, and defects in the structure of the ship itself, In both cases, whether the defect isin the structure of a building or in the structure of a ship, the employee would, on this hypothesis, be restricted to his rights against his employer as occupier, even where the defect in the building or the ship was attributable to the fault ofa third party. In both cases, no doubt, nice distinctions might have to be drawn between equipment on the one hand and the structure of the building or the ship on the other hand; but, since it is plain that in any event such distinctions would have to be drawn in the case of premises on land, itis not necessarily surprising that Parliament should have intended similar distinctions to be drawn in respect of a ship at sea, although it is likely that more difficult questions could arise in the case of ships than in the case of premises on land. If this were to be right, it would explain why ships or vessels were excluded from the definition of equipment’ in the Act, and it would follow that the appeal in the present case would have to be dismissed. I must confess to having felt some attraction for this approach, as a matter of logic; but Ihave come to the conclusion that its practical consequences are such that I do not think that it can have been the intention of the legislature so to provide. As my noble and learned friend Lord Oliver points out in his speech, ships or vessels may vary enormously in character and in size, from the Trinity House launch or even a speedboat to a supertanker ora bulk carrier. Itis very difficult indeed to imagine that small craft should be excluded from ‘equipment’ provided by the employer for the purposes of his business; but no sensible distinction can be drawn between small and large vessels for present purposes; certainly the approach which I have set out provides no basis for any such distinction, Moreover, it seems to me that, in the case of ships, the distinction between the equipment on the ship and the structure of the ship is not only very difficult to draw in practice, but is artificial in the extreme. In any event, the duty of care imposed under the Occupiers’ Liability Act 1957 may apply not only in respect of vessels, but also in respect of vehicles and aircraft: see s 1(3Xa). I have therefore come to the conclusion, in agreement with my noble and learned friend, and with Lloyd LJ in the Court of Appeal, that the definition of equipment in s 1(3) of the 1969 Act must have been included in the Act for the purpose of clarification only, and that the mere fact that ships and vessels were not expressly included in the definition cannot have been intended to have the effect of cutting down the ordinary meaning of the word ‘equipment’ by excluding ships or vessels from that word. For these reasons I too would allow the appeal. Appeal allowed. Solicitors: Evill & Coleman (for the plaintiffs); Holman Fenwick & Willan (for the defendants). Mary Rose Plummer Barrister.