FMC GRANTS HASCO ORAL ARGUMENT TO DEFEND COMMON CARRIER STATUS

FMC GRANTS HASCO ORAL ARGUMENT TO DEFEND COMMON CARRIER STATUS    The U.S. Federal Maritime Commission has granted Shanghai Hai Hua Shipping Co. an opportunity to defend its status as an ocean carrier in the form of an oral argument.
   Since the FMC ordered the investigation into HASCO’s status as an ocean common carrier under the 1984 Shipping Act on June 26, the company has charged that the commission failed to provide adequate notice to provide its side. HASCO’s lawyers requested “the opportunity for the parties and the commissioners to discuss them face to face.”
   “Although we find HASCO’s request for oral argument overly broad, we will grant it,” the FMC said. “However, oral argument will be limited to the issues of whether HASCO is a vessel-operating common carrier within the meaning of the Shipping Act, and, if not, whether its existing tariff should be canceled and a cease-and-desist order entered.”
   A request by HASCO’s lawyers to cross-examine an FMC witness to the investigation, Jeremiah D. Hospital, chief of the agency’s Office of Agreements, was denied.
   HASCO alleged that “cross-examination is necessary to determine (Hospital’s) knowledge and experience in drafting, negotiating, reviewing, implementing, or interpreting time charters, as well as his knowledge of the time charters of other carriers, and his competence to assess the economic viability of ocean common carrier services,” the FMC said.
   The commission agreed with its Bureau of Enforcement’s contention that HASCO failed to identify any injustice by prohibiting the cross-examination of Hospital.