Law of Yachts and Yachting
Page 24
CHAPTER 2
Yacht Registration
Yacht Registration
- 1. Historical introduction 24
- 2. The modern law 29
- 3. Registration under Part I of the Register 30
- 4. Registration as a small ship on Part III of the Register 38
- 5. The entitlement to fly the British flag 39
- 6. Commercial use of yachts and passenger yachts 41
1. Historical Introduction
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The origin of ship registration. Ship registration in England has its origins in the first of the seventeenth-century Navigation Acts,1 described in its preamble as “An Act for the Encouraging and Increasing of Shipping and Navigation”.2 It is hardly surprising that the 1660 Act makes no mention of yachts, firstly because the Navigation Acts were concerned with the protection of trade and, secondly, because recreational sailing was then in its very early infancy.3 The sport is believed to have originated in The Netherlands, and it was from that country that the Dutch East India Company made a gift of the first Royal Yacht, Mary,4 to King Charles II on his restoration to the throne in 1660.