Hughes v Dundalk Harbour Commissioners

• Jurisdiction: Ireland
• Judgment Date: 01 January 1923
• Date: 01 January 1923
• Court: Chancery Division (Irish Free State)

Hughes and others

and

Dundalk Harbour Commissioners

Public body - Summary procedure - Right of action - Pilotage - Pilotage Act, 1913 (2 3 Geo. V., c. 31); Pilotage Order Confirmation (No. 2) Act, 1920 (10 11 Geo. V., c. civ) - Compulsory pilotage - Contravention by shipowner - Duty of pilotage authority to licensed pilots.

By the Pilotage Act, 1913 (2 & 3 Geo. V., c. 31), the employment of pilots licensed by the port authority, and payment to that authority of the appropriate pilotage dues, were made obligatory in the case of all vessels entering, leaving, or making use of the port and harbour of D., other than vessels excepted under that Act, and vessels navigated by masters or mates licensed as pilots by the port authority, the master of any vessel bound by the compulsory pilotage enactments who refused to take the service of a licensed pilot when tendered being liable to a penalty on summary conviction. The defendants, the pilotage authority, received the pilot fees, which were pooled and paid partly to the plaintiffs, who were licensed pilots, and partly to a fund created for the plaintiffs' benefit called the pilots' benefit fund. A shipowner L., who used the port, and whose vessels came within the compulsory pilotage regulations, refused to take the services of the plaintiffs when tendered, and refused to pay to the defendants the pilotage fees which would have been payable if the...