ANNUAL CONFERENCE

THE 153rd ANNUAL CONFERENCE

(previously AGM) of the ASSOCIATION OF AVERAGE ADJUSTERS

held at: Lloyd’s Old Library One Lime Street London EC3M 7HA

on Thursday, 12th May, 2022

In the Chair: Mr Michiel Starmans

THE SECRETARY: Good morning to everyone. It is lovely to see so many faces here again. For those of you who do not know me, I am Ann Waite, the Secretary of the Association. Welcome to our AGM or Annual Conference, as it is called now. Sorry, old habits die hard. Could I ask everyone to put your phones on mute or make sure they are turned off; the usual housekeeping. At least we are not asking you to unmute your Zoom calls today. It really only remains for me to introduce our Chairman, Michiel Starmans. THE CHAIRMAN: Good morning and welcome to the 153rd Annual Conference. It has been such a long time since we have seen each other, some two years, and we are all fed up with virtual meetings, so it is good that the Old Library is still here and that so many of you could come. Unfortunately, some countries still have Covid restrictions but, hopefully, we will see them all next year. Joseph Grasso - Association of Average Adjusters of US & Canada Barbara Holland - US Maritime Law Association Esteban Vivanco - Association Mondiale de Dispacheurs Stefano Cavallo - Italian Association of Average Adjusters Vibeke Kofoed - Nordic Average Adjusters Association Joern Groninger - Verein Deutscher Dispacheure First of all, I would like to say hello to our very distinguished guests who are listed here and who I had the pleasure of having a meal with yesterday in a lovely place in Chelsea, in the Manicomio restaurant. We understood that means “Restaurant of Fools”, so I think it was the right place to be there, and it is good to see that my guests could attend from the US, Argentina and Continental Europe. As I said yesterday, we had a private dinner with 14 people and seven nationalities, so it is not just an English Association of Average Adjusters, it is a true worldwide Association. We now turn to the annual report with what happened last year.

1. Report by the Chairman, Michiel Starmans on the past year of the Association

At the Annual General Meeting of Fellows, which was held yesterday, Sir Nigel Teare was elected to serve as the Chairman of our Association for the year 2022/23. Since his CV is embarrassingly impressive, I will first summarise the relevant adjusters’ parts and read it to you before I ask Sir Nigel to stand. Sir Nigel was the ideal candidate as a recently retired judge of the High Court of England and Wales, who has decided several high profile shipping cases, some of them involving General Average, like the ‘Polar’ piracy case in 2021, where Sir Nigel held that bills of lading did not exclude owners from claiming GA contribution from cargo interests for the ransom allowed in GA, despite incorporation of charterparty clauses in the bills of lading. Another matter was - and it is easier to say it in French – the CMA CGM Libra grounding, where Sir Nigel held that a defective passage plan resulting in a grounding outside the fairway rendered the vessel unseaworthy and entitled the cargo interests to refuse payment of their GA contribution. This ruling was confirmed by the Supreme Court in 2021. Sir Nigel has been appointed as arbitrator at 10 Fleet Street since his retirement as a High Court judge. He also acted as a Lloyd’s salvage arbitrator and appeal arbitrator in his earlier professional years. He is an Honorary Fellow at St Peter’s College, Oxford and an Honorary Fellow of our Association. May I ask Sir Nigel now to stand and I know that you will wish to join me in congratulating him on his election as Chairman and wishing him a successful year in office. (Applause)

SIR NIGEL TEARE: Thank you very much indeed. I am deeply honoured to have been elected your Chairman. I am of course not an average adjuster, but throughout my career I have had the pleasure of having to read many average adjustments and I have always been in awe of their comprehensive nature, their detail and their fairness. As you have heard, I have had to deal with one or two General Average cases in court which I have very much enjoyed and so I have every expectation that I will very much enjoy this year. Thank you very much. (Applause) THE CHAIRMAN: Thank you very much, Sir Nigel. We also elected Burkhard Fischer as Vice Chairman yesterday and if I am right I guess it is the seventh time that you are Vice Chairman. I understand that even Prince Charles is feeling kind of jealous and he sends you best regards as a brother in arms in waiting to ascend the throne. I would like to express my sincere appreciation to Burkhard for his support and guidance during my two years of chairmanship. I would ask him to stand so we can offer our congratulations for reelection for a seventh term and wish him all the best during the next year as Vice Chairman. (Applause)

Michiel Starmans with Sir Nigel Teare

THE CHAIRMAN: More people who can stand, let’s see? David Pannell. David, this is your picture on the website! And even Google Search could not find you. It is quite astonishing that you manage to hide very well. Obviously, you need a new picture. Yesterday at the same meeting David was elected as an Honorary Life Fellow. Before we acknowledge that, I like to say something else. You have decided to step down as Convener of the Examining Committee after 23 years of service. Your successor will be Keith Martin. At the meeting yesterday you were elected as Honorary Life Fellow of our Association, for your dedicated work as the driving force behind the changes to the old examination format to the modern modular exams at the beginning of this century. You highlighted the worrying decline in exam candidates in your address in 1998 and decided to head up the Examining Committee from 1999 until today, in order to turn this around, and so you did. And we now have 49 Fellows, 11 Senior Associates and 150 Associates. Half of the Fellows and all the Associates have qualified under your leadership. May I therefore ask you to stand so we can honour you for this amazing achievement. (Applause) Thank you very much, David. The other officers of the Association remain Tristan Miller as Treasurer and David Clancey as Convenor of the Advisory & Dispute Resolution Panel. I would have loved of course to honour you as well in a similar manner as I just did, but Ann has told me there are a couple of hot starters at the lunch venue and that she likes to eat them hot!

We carry on with the sad news over the last 12 months. John Ahern, a past Chairman, died at the age of 73 last February. John worked for over 50 years as an adjuster with RHL and Rogers Wilkin Ahern and was a coauthor of A Guide to Marine Hull Insurance Claims. Apart from being an excellent adjuster, he was known as a man of immense kindness, a talented teacher, with unique humour. He served many years on the Exam Committee. In his address in May 2011, John gave a very distinctive summary of piracy cases, case law and advice on which insurance should pay the piracy related costs. We received the following resignations: Doug Cole, Tsukasa Sekine and Gordon Cameron. They have all resigned from the Association as a result of their retirement, and we wish them well.

Events

Now to the events of last year. On 2 November, we had the BMLA annual dinner which was attended by Andrew Slade as the AAA’s representative. On 1 December, we had the informal Adjusters’ Dinner. This was the first informal dinner organised by the AAA and was attended by some 100 members at round tables with no black tie. The setting was in the Abraham Lincoln Room, which is one floor down from where we usually have our traditional dinner in the Savoy, as we will have tonight. The occasion was born by the rejection of the Savoy to roll the full paid deposit over to the next year due to the Covid restrictions. The Savoy finally agreed to roll 50% over and use the other 50% to pay for the dinner. This gesture was much appreciated and so was the evening. The Salvage and Wreck Conference was held on 1 and 2 December 2021. I was able attend this conference which conveniently coincided with our informal dinner on 1 December. The AAA was a supporting association for this event and had been provided with a complimentary pass. The two day conference covered the future of LOF contracts, salvage and wreck removal in US waters, revision of BIMCO’s wreck removal contracts and corporate social responsibility. February 2022, the UK Chamber of Shipping dinner. Tristan Miller attended this dinner which was held in the company of 760 guests at Grosvenor House. Decarbonisation of shipping played a key role in the President’s address, with a special focus on building green ships by, ultimately, 2030, because these ships will

still be around by the time we reach the net zero target of 2050. The Minister of Shipping acknowledged the decarbonisation challenge and remarked that the UK has a wonderful opportunity to step into high tech ship building post Brexit and cut red tape. On 22 and 23 of March 2022 we had the ISU dinner and Associates Day. Burkhard Fischer and Rui Hao attended the events. The topics covered included the potential closure of the Lloyd’s Salvage Branch. Kevin Clarke and David Lawrence were speaking and confirmed that the LSB was there to stay.

We finally get to this picture, which was taken at the IUA/ AAA hybrid seminar on 24 March. This joint hybrid seminar on practical aspects of collision claims was held at the Cavendish Conference Centre, London, with 51 attendees in person and 65 attendees via the virtual platform. It was the first hybrid presentation by the AAA, which appears now to be the norm since the Covid pandemic. Due to the pandemic this seminar was postponed twice, in 2020 and 2021.

Guest speakers were Alistair Johnston, CJC Law and Chris Zavos, Kennedys, with myself acting as moderator of this event. The seminar outlined the principles of collisions and liability, apportionment, forum shopping, limitation, security, insurance, quantum and single and cross liabilities. After the seminar a buffet lunch was served to the attendees.

Michiel Starmans with Alistair Johnston, CJC Law and Chris Zavos , Kennedys

The last thing that still stands in planning is the Young CMI/AAA Associates hybrid seminar which is planned for August 2022. Amy O’Neill and myself will organise and represent the AAA with one or two Associates as speakers, so any volunteers please go to Amy. The likely subject will be war risk related and a flier will be sent out shortly. We hope to organise it in Rotterdam and if possible combine it with a ship visit on one of the vessels operated by the Spliethoff Group. Website

Work has continued over the last year in updating and changing various parts of the website. Robert Tomlinson has updated legal cases from 2000. The Rules of Practice revised in 2020, which were previously only available to logged-in members, have been moved to a section of the website easily accessible and available to the general public. The Committee of Management decided at the end of last year that the Association should consider a new website, as it was felt that it needed a fresh approach and to be more interactive in terms of online booking of events, exams, the annual dinner, etcetera. A sub committee was set up with Amy O’Neill taking the lead. It is expected that the new website will be up and running in June 2022. I have intentionally put the year and the month because in my own experience IT matters tend to take a long time, so I am very impressed with that. I would like to congratulate the team for getting this work done in a fairly limited period of time.

Examinations

Before I provide more details about exam results I would like to inform you that apart from David Pannell stepping down as Convenor, as already mentioned, Miles Duncan, John MacDonald, and Gerald Ewing will also step down this month as the three longest serving members of the Examining Committee. If present, may I ask you to stand so we can recognise and appreciate the contribution you have made to the Committee and our Association. (Applause) Thank you very much for all the good work that you have done over the years. And of course, it has already been decided who will be their successors. They will be Rui Hao, Heather Robinson and Joseph Shead. They are all here as well.

Keith Martin will remain the Chief Examiner and take over David’s role as Convenor. He has already put his pencil on the drawing board for the future plans for the Examining Committee. David has volunteered to stay on as expert consultant. Ann Waite will be responsible for the logistics and administration of the exams. I would like to wish Keith and all members of the Committee all the best in continuing the good work for this important committee within our Association. Now we go to the exam results. We are putting up all the names here since 2019, because since our last inperson Annual General Meeting none of them has previously been acknowledged publicly. Associates are candidates who have passed Modules A1: the Marine Insurance Act and Principles of Insurance, and Module A2: hull and cargo claims. There were ten new Associates in 2019, 16 new Associates in 2020, and 2021 was a very successful year with 25 new Associates. All the pubs were closed, so presumably they had nothing else to do than study. You can see what happens when the pubs open again! Only five new Associates in March 2022. Can I ask the candidates present here today to stand up so they can receive a round of applause for their success. (Applause)

2019 Associates

Nikos Michalakopoulos (Margetis Marine, Athens) Sameen Naveed (Chubb Insurance Australia, Sydney) Nishi Patel (RHL, London) Georgia Simiakaki (VC Marne Claims Adjusters, Piraeus) Stella Rizioti (Guardian Maritime, Athens) Nicole Skiadas (Stewart & Hazell Marine, Athens) Tan Si Hua (RHL, Singapore) Christ Dandhie (Radita Hutama Internusa, Jakarta) Raihan Ramadhillah (MCO Prima Indonesia, Jakarta) Kang Byeol Cheol (Korea Shipping Assoc, Seoul)

2020 Associates

Max Barker (RHL, London) Giorgio Cavallo (RHL, London and Studio Dott Giorgio Cavallo, Genoa) Albana Bibaj (Siat, Genoa) Tomaso Roncallo (Siat, Genoa) Laura Rocca (Studio Tecnico Lonoce, Genoa)

2020 Associates (continued) Molli Stanton (RHL, Liverpool) (Evelyn) Ho Lai Fun (Aon, Singapore) Arnold Van Hal (Van Traa Advocaten, Rotterdam) Iris Regtien (Smallegange Nv, Rotterdam) (Brian) Chen Yi San (Survey Association, Copenhagen/Singapore) Donal Keaney (Ince & Co, London) Clare Birchenhough (Ince & Co, London) William Smyth (Axa XL, London) Shamim Ahmed (Holbud Ship Management, London) Phoichau Dang (Aon, London) Swapnodeep Mondal (Anglo-eastern Ship Management, Hong Kong)

2021 Associates

Alice Duncan (RHL, Liverpool) Alberto Comitardi (Thomas Miller, London) Mark Revis (London International Average Adjusters China) M Khairul Nizham (Edge Insurance Brokers, Singapore) Niamh McKeown (RHL, Liverpool) Jonathan Warriner (RHL, Liverpool) Efi Saisana-Palyvou (The Swedish Club, Piraeus) Georgia Exadaktylou (Fassolis Law Firm, Athens) Vasiliki Chiampas (Seascope Hellas, Piraeus) Dimitrios Tsekos (VC Adjusters, Piraeus) Stavriani Christea (Roxana Shipping, Athens) Anuradha Prasad More (United India Insce Co, Haridwar) Yuno Sakai (Charles Taylor Japan, Tokyo) (Rocky) Lok Kan Siu (Hong Kong Pilots Assoc, Hong Kong) (Tiffany) Zhang Xinming (Cosco Shipping Co, Hong Kong) Ingrid Svensson (The Swedish Club, Gothenburg) Joel Lloyd Pinheiro (Quest Marine Llc, Dubai) Abhishek Pathak (Cargo Surveyor, Kolkata) Neil Best (Aqualis Braemar LOC, Singapore) (Julia) Zhu Zizhen (Skuld Far East, Hong Kong) (Cory) Chow Yuk Yi (Charles Taylor Adjusting, Hong Kong) (Jenny) Chu Wing Yin (Asia Maritime Pacific, Hong Kong) (Yvonne) Yi Liu (Charles Taylor Adjusting, Beijing) (Horace) Huang Zhanghao (RHL, Shanghai) (Stephanie) Wang Chia Sheng (Overseas Adjusters & Surveyors, Taipei)

2022 Associates

Sean Haake (RHL, Liverpool) Dave Barnard (Reed Smith, London) Anthony Ashurst (RHL London) Evanthia Anastasiadis (RHL Hellas, Greece) Maged Abdel Naby (Mecon, Alexandria)

Annual Report 2022

Each year the Association awards a prize of merit to the candidate outstanding in their achievement of associateship. This year the award has been given to Jenny Chu Wing Yin from Asia Maritime Pacific (Hong Kong) Ltd. I do not think she is here. However, we have Georgio Cavallo here, and I would like to ask him to come up so he can receive his certificate for outstanding performance in 2020. (Applause)

Georgio Cavallo with David Pannell

Senior Associates are Associates who have passed Module F1: GA salvage and COGSA, plus one Module of either F2: hull & machinery, loss of hire, war risk, cargo, or Module F3: collisions, recoveries, freight. As with the Associates, we would also like to acknowledge publicly those who achieved their senior associateship during the pandemic years. In 2020, we had two Senior Associates.

James Willan (RHL, Liverpool) (Jimmy) Hung-Yi Chen (Overseas Adjusters & Surveyors, Taipei) James is here, and we will mention him again shortly. If Jimmy is here, can I ask him to come forward. Jimmy is not here. In 2021, there were three new Senior Associates. Phillip McCabe (RHL, Liverpool) Christian Freuling (RHL Hellas, Greece) Julia Roumanou (Independent Average Adjusters, Piraeus) Phillip is here and we will mention him again shortly. If Christian and Julia are here, can I ask them please to come forward? They are not here either. We have the March 2022 results, Senior Associates, two of them. Jack Ellis (Willis Towers Watson, London) Ayodeji Sasegbon (Campbell Johnston Clark, London) Could I ask Jack and Ayodeji to come up and receive their certificates. (Applause) At least it is not a brown envelope. Thank you. Congratulations. 10

2022 exam success From left: Jack Ellis (Senior Associate), John Thompson (Fellow), Phillip McCabe (Fellow), Deji Sasegbon (Senior Associate).

Fellows – they have to pass all the above modules, plus the practical exam, Module F4 as it is called now. During the pandemic, we had six new Fellows. In 2020 Nanami Hara and Rui Hao. 2021, Ryoko Shimura and James Willan. 2022, John Thompson and Phillip McCabe. Can I please ask all of you to come forward to receive your certificates and your badge. (Applause)

From left: Rui Hao (Fellow 2020), James Willan (Fellow 2021), John Thompson (Fellow 2022), Phillip McCabe (Fellow 2022), and in front Nanami Hara (Fellow 2020).

Membership As you can see, the membership has remained about the same. We are two down. Just to give some additional information, unfortunately we lost BIMCO as an affiliate which did not want to extend, but of course, we still have ISU, the BMLA and the UK Chamber of Shipping, and we appreciate that this continues to be of mutual benefit. The shift in number of Associates is due to a reshuffle of the numbers, so it looks worrying when you look at the apparent decline of UK based associates, but this has been compensated entirely when you look a little further down with the apparent increase of overseas associates. You can see the rest are mainly the same but of course we have two new Fellows there, making 44. 11

Affiliates Associates Fellows

2021 2022 4 3 84 43 42 44 Honorary 15 15 Honorary Life Fellows 3 4 Non-Practising Fellows 2 2 Overseas Associates 48 107 Overseas Subscribers 185 163 Representatives 8 8 Senior Associates 11 11 UK Subscribers 68 68 Total 470 468

In order to professionalise our membership, the Committee of Management decided that, with effect from 1 June membership year, we have new terms and conditions for membership and they will be applicable to new applicants who will need to agree to them when joining. The terms and conditions cover shorter timelines for payment of subscriptions and an admin fee for memberships that have been terminated when a member reapplies for membership. It happens that Associates just do not renew and then when the dinner is there they renew, which incurs administration costs. The second change outlines the standards of professional conduct expected of members . In the terms and conditions we clarified that titles can only be used on fully paid annual subscriptions. You cannot use your associateship title or senior associateship title if you are no longer contributing your fee. Confirmation of consent to the AAA’s privacy policy and the responsibility of members to comply with all international sanctions is now required. We of course cannot afford to have a member who is on a sanction list. The Advisory & Dispute Resolution Panel David Clancey and his team did not have any referrals during last year, but David has been active in placing the new Rules of Practice on the website, including the new rule B26 Vessel in Ballast and Under Charter: Contributing Interests. This is item 2 on the agenda and David will give a short presentation hereafter about this new rule and why the Association thought it was needed. The General Average Sub-Committee The GA Sub-Committee, chaired by Burkhard Fischer, continued to work on producing guidance notes following The Longchamp Supreme Court decision. The sub committee issued a list of 15 examples of substituted expenses and whether they can be allowed in General Average on a rule based on fairness. The document has been issued as official Opinion G24B and the original advisory committee Opinion is now renumbered as G24A. Hopefully, many of you have had an opportunity to review the guidance and appreciate the high level of expertise involved with this work. I would like to thank both Burkhard and David for everything they have done to make the contribution to this complex work.

Since the GA Sub Committee has undertaken work as a Sub Committee of the Advisory Panel, David has volunteered to give some more background about the work and content of this new Advisory Committee Opinion under agenda item 2. This brings me to my last point and that is that I would like to thank those who have made my job easier and contributed to the smooth running of the Association throughout the Covid crisis. That is of course the officers and Committee members of the Association, the Fellows who have contributed to particular projects, the secretariat at Charles Taylor Insurance Services, in particular Sue Green with her team in Newcastle, Ann Waite, as the patient Secretary who knows how to make life easy for any Chairman, as she did for me and, hopefully, she will carry on doing this for many future Chairmen, and Burkhard Fischer as Vice Chairman who stepped in when it was needed in the two years of my chairmanship. Thank you very much.

2. NEW RULE OF PRACTICE B26 VESSEL IN BALLAST AND UNDER CHARTER: CONTRIBUTING INTERESTS.

THE CHAIRMAN: Could I now invite David to say something on item 2 on the agenda? MR. DAVID CLANCEY: David Clancey, Convenor of the Advisory & Dispute Resolution Panel. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. It is the role of the panel to oversee the Association’s Rules of Practice. As we have not had an Annual Conference since 2019, it is my task to bring you up to date. After Richard Cornah had been elected Chairman in 2019, he decided it was time to review the Rules of Practice and where necessary brought them up to date. After he had done the initial review, the matter was passed to this panel and we carried out a detailed review of all the rules, with the exception of Rule B26, which proved to be a bit more of a problem than the remaining rules. For the most part, the changes were no more than bringing them in line with modern thinking and practice. To this we added two new rules, D9, covering temporary generator hire, and G10, liner vessels, which only stated the accepted approach to both of those items. The revised rules were passed as probationary at the AGM in May 2020 and formally adopted at the AGM in May 2021. During the 2021 year the panel set about revising Rule B26, as you can see repeated in your agenda, and on the screen. After considerable discussion, we came up with this wording. The main point at dispute was over the length of time the General Average runs and to what extent any sub voyage charter affects the length of the General Average. It was not felt that this should apply as the vessel is controlled by the time charterers throughout the whole period. Of course, when a time charter is also cancelled that brings an end to the General Average. In the May 2021 AGM this was voted on and obtained the required majority and was adopted as a probationary rule. At the AGM of Fellows yesterday the rule was again voted on and as a result has now been fully adopted and takes its place in our published Rules of Practice, which, as you have been advised, are all on the website. Our Chairman has already advised you of Burkhard Fischer’s hard work in producing an Opinion in regard to The Longchamp and its effect on General Average under Rule F. This of course is only a matter for English law as other countries will have to consider whether they wish to take the same view. I do not really think it is necessary to say a lot more about how this process is arrived at. It is clear that a lot of work is put into it and QC’s opinion was also obtained on the wording. I would like to thank Burkhard Fischer for his efforts and advise everybody that this is available again on the website and has been released to the market in general. Thank you. (Applause)