In Aus, we are different in that as long as the equipment is supplied in original spec it is legal(as long as its safe of course). I find it hard that every time, no matter what equipment it is, that the regs change, this equipment has to be modified potentially at the customers cost, which could be huge. It nearly would cancel all old equipment beyond 10 years from being legal. Does this suggest that the original design is very flawed? Not sure. But we do have a system here which is essentially called a risk assessment(mainly to employees and passengers) which go towards safety concerns generally. I have noted that floors levels as an eg, is a massive priority in the US, but it isn't that bad here, which is good as pure floors levs are tough to consistantly achieve(within specs +/-). I have worked on o/h cranes before(kone), and an eg was the new code stated that you didn't have to have a hook latch, but must provision to do so. However what we did was suggest as a 'risk assessment' that if a load was lost due to a sling 'bouncing' off, then potential load damage/human injury could occur and thus the use of a latch should still be used. This was our way around the original manufacture law.