Letter to the Editor

I fully expect that the regulations will cost lives when we get four or five years down the road and some lifejackets no longer do their job.

Encouraged by the Coroner, the government insists it will save lives by requiring personal flotation devices (PFDs) to be worn by all people on boats up to and including 4.8 metres when under way.

Wrong! It has, in fact, opened the door for poor quality inflatable PFDs which sometimes do not work. Since inflatables are the only PFDs compact enough to wear all the time, this could be fatal.

The new rules now accept PFDs approved to European standards which are enforced only by a "self audit" and not independently like Australian standards. This has resulted in some PFDs of questionable quality, especially from Mediterranean countries.

Only this week, a BIA member showed me a European-approved PFD which failed to inflate when tested by the owner. Imagine the horror of landing in the water and finding that your lifejacket does not work. Because of faults like this, the US Navy returned thousands of European PFDs it had bought -- but they are deemed fine for Victorians.

It gets worse. Even good-quality inflatable PFDs need regular servicing every one to two years.

Realistically, many won't get it. The regulatory impact statement (RIS) for the new rules chose to ignore this.

Inferior PFDs are only one of many flaws in the new rules. They imply that boaties will be safe as long as they wear a PFD. It's a foolish proposition that encourages risk-taking, even if the PFDs work. And if they don't work, heaven help us.

Education, not regulation, is the answer.

Lindsay Grenfell, CEO Boating Industry Association of Victoria