The Council common position follows the Commission proposal and incorporates most of the European Parliament's amendments.
In detail, the common position requires:
- the total number of inspections to correspond to at least 25% of the number of ships entering the ports of each Member States during a typical year;
- stricter inspections to be carried out if there is a likelihood of identifying irregularities on board;
- priority inspections to be carried out on certain categories of ships;
- detailed inspections to be carried out where there are clear grounds for believing that a ship does not meet international standards;
- enhanced controls to be carried out on certain categories of ship where there are clear grounds for doing so;
- ships with deficiencies which are clearly hazardous to safety, health or the environment to be detained or operation prohibited;
- ships which refuse to comply with a request by a Member State to comply with international standards to be refused access to all Community ports;
- ships frequently detained to be entered on a black list;
- the competent authorities to cooperate and exchange information on ships using their ports;
- the competent authorities to publish quarterly lists of ships detained.
The main amendments incorporated by the Council concerned:
- enhanced inspections to be carried out on passenger ships providing regular services between Member States;
- the professional qualifications of inspectors.
The Council also amended the proposal by:
- defining a surveyor inspector as a "civil servant ";
- making a distinction between "detention" and "prohibited operation";
- changing the scope of the directive: controls by the port state should apply in all ports, including inland ports, offshore installations in service on the continental shelf of a Member State and ships anchored off such ports or offshore terminals;
- changing the provisions governing enhanced inspections for certain categories of ships (old ships and passenger ships);
- introducing a new provision allowing the inspection to be suspended and corrective action demanded as and when it becomes clear that the general state of the ship is not up to standard;
- increasing the number of cases in which a ship which does not comply and has been refused access may be admitted in order to prevent accidents and coastal pollution;
- defining oil tankers subject to enhanced inspections more accurately.�