where do you want this to end?
Is it just for when the DM/Ins is being paid? Or do you want them to take it upon themselves to check peoples cards before diving with their friends? What if people have different qualifications?
Again.. 3rd time to explain..
I suggested that agencies imposed standards within membership agreements. That is primarily for dive centres, but also for individual pro members.
1) Agencies already do this in regards to training activities; in respect to the membership requirements to abide by agency
course standards.
2) Customer expectations when walking into an agency 'branded' dive centre are that the agency plays an
active or
regulatory role in ensuring safe diving practices are
upheld by
their member dive centre and its staff.
3) No such agency regulation exists beyond the strict parameters of training programmes only... and the broad need to comply with
vague documents like 'Safe Diving Practices', or to show 'professionalism' etc.
4) Taking newly qualified OW divers on very technical level wreck penetrations at 38m, or taking newly qualified OW divers to 48m in a Blue Hole, ISN'T
specifically prohibited in "Safe Diving Practices", so activities like this
happen frequently.
5) When fatalities occur in non-training dive activities, agencies will
still suspend memberships etc, on the grounds of negligence or lack of professionalism.
6) This is entirely
REACTIVE; applying sanction
after the fact. Whereas stipulating more specific standards in membership agreements would be
PROACTIVE; applying guidance
before the fact. In short, prevention is better than cure.. especially when people get hurt or die.
7) I'm talking about agency originated; self-regulation via membership requirements. For most agencies it'd cover professional membership activities in a professional capacity. In the same way that occupational regulations and laws also cover 'professional' divers,
in regions where those laws exist.
8) Nonetheless, agency membership standards DO already exist that require professional, responsible and diligent behaviour at ALL times. This
already covers scenarios like a DM diving with friends or even an instructor posting in online forums. It just doesn't cover specific details of what constitutes adhering to "Safe Diving Practices".
9) The industry has never had a problem with the concept of equivalent qualifications.
10) Agencies
already demand that members (
DMs, Instructors, centres, resorts and boats) adhere to "Safe Diving Practices".
11) However, they've singularly failed to define those practices specifically enough, which has led to gross abuses.
Note: This is true especially in areas where local or national regulations, or lack of litigation risk, do nothing to curtail diving centres and staff acting in a blatantly unsafe manner.
12) The vast overwhelming majority of dives conducted (especially under paid supervision of agency members) occur in 'holiday' locations that aren't effectively state regulated or where civil litigation is problematic.
i.e. developing and 3rd world nations in tropical regions.
Note: most 1st world / developed countries have capable non-diving specific regulatory bodies which assure customer safety in every instance where an individual or business provides ANY service for divers. i.e. H&S at Work agencies, business regulation bodies, customer safety organisations etc..
In short - In geographical areas where there is no externally provided regulation and in occupational areas where diving agencies provide no regulation....THERE IS NO REGULATION.
Professionally guided diving activities remain a FREE-FOR-ALL, where individual 'pros' and dive centres are expected to self-regulate to ensure diver safety .... but have time and again proven they cannot, or will not do that prudently or acceptably, for commercial and other reasons.
13) There is no agency QA process that covers blatantly unsafe practices beyond the strict parameters of training activities. Guided diving is literally a FREE-FOR-ALL.
14) In a nutshell, the RSTC mandates minimum standards in respect to
diving training. This
forces agency standards compliance with
diving training only. There is
no version of RSTC that covers non-training functions of the dive industry.
15) Outside of the parameters of
diving training, agencies have shown
zero initiative to assure diver safety through professional member regulation or quality assurance. Basically, when not forced to do so, the agencies haven't done anything.
16) Agencies have not mandated or defined any specific
minimum standards or
operating codes to be applied for guided diving, and other non-training activities, carried out by their individual and business members for the public.
