Newhaven Port & Properties Ltd. are the Statutory Harbour Authority for the Port of Newhaven and have responsibilities and duties under various Health & Safety, Environmental and Maritime Legislation and Guidance.

To ensure compliance with all of the above, NPP have produced a Safety Management System that sets out the duties of Management and Staff to assist them in achieving this goal and to continuously monitor and improve their standards.

The Port Marine Safety Code, revised in 2016, is a Department for Transport Document, written in consultation with the Port's Industry to produce a code that has been developed to improve safety in UK ports and to enable harbour authorities to manage their marine operations to nationally agreed standards. 

It provides the standard against which the policies, procedures and the performance of harbour authorities can be measured. It also descibes the role of board members, officers and key personnel in relation to safety of navigation and summarises the main statutory duties and powers of harbour authorities.

To assist Newhaven Port & Properties Ltd. in achieving the standards required, the Safety Management System and Annual Management Review Action Plan acts as the Safety Plan required by the Port Marine Safety Code, whereby lessons are learned and objectives are set to improve standards and operating procedures.  

To obtain an independant monitoring of the system, external consultants are employed to audit the system on a bi-annual basis to confirm compliance and make recommendations to improve. These recommendations form the basis of the objectives to be achieved.