SCOTRAIL STRIKE VOTE

RMT helpline 0800 376 3706 :: july/august 2016 :: RMTnews 11 The International Transport Federation and the Port State Control, MCA, has detained the MV Malaviya Seven offshore supply vessel in Aberdeen in what RMT described as a “blatant example of modern day slavery”. The decision to detain the vessel in the country’s oil capital was taken to secure pay and benefits for the fifteen Indian nationals who are working on the vessel. None of the crew members have been paid for almost two months while several have not received a penny from their employer for several months. RMT and the ITF have asked the UK Border Control authorities to investigate concerns that ship owners and charters/brokers are effectively applying a form of modern day slavery across the oil and gas sector. A second vessel, the MV Malaviya Twenty faces a similar fate in the port of Great Yarmouth where Port State Control has been alerted to a similar situation on that vessel. The detained vessel MV Malaviya Seven has been on recent charter in the UK offshore sector with BP, Wood Group, Dana and Premier Oil. This is therefore a vessel working in and out of UK Ports and servicing the UK sector. Despite this, and even if the exploited workers were paid today, they would still only be earning around $2 US dollars per hour, less than a fifth of the UK national minimum wage provisions. RMT general secretary Mick Cash said that the seizure of the vessel had exposed the scandal of modern day slavery on ships right at the heart of the UK’s oil capital, Aberdeen. “It also exposes the shameful practices in the exploitation of our natural resources, practices that must be outlawed and regulated against immediately. “These ships of shame are a blatant abuse of migrant workers and are contrary to any number of stated industry and government objectives around human rights. “It is also a catalyst for the dumping of UK seafarers, many thousands of whom are now drawing benefit from the state. “In the week where the former Chief of BP, Trevor Garlick, is awarded an OBE for his services to the industry we have to ask if those “services” included the introduction of slave labour practices to our country. “We’ve lost over 1,000 seafarer jobs in the offshore supply vessel (OSV) sector, mainly through the flouting of employment, equality and visa law. “Record numbers of OSVs are laid up in Aberdeen and other east coast ports, in some cases with non-EEA crew retained on board, in contravention of domestic and international law, let alone high-minded concepts such as Corporate Social Responsibility. "These practices should be a source of shame to the oil and gas industry which hides behind the low oil price to justify this shocking exploitation of foreign seafarers which borders on modern slavery,” he said. RMT national secretary Steve Todd also added that current practices in the OSV sector were a direct threat to UK seafarers’ continued employment in the industry, dumping thousands on the dole and making a mockery of the government’s industry- driven mantra of Maximising Economic Recovery of oil and gas from the North Sea. He welcomed the fact that RMT Parliamentary group chair Ian Mearns MP had tabled Early Day Motion 231(see below) to highlight the government’s failure to prevent job losses amongst UK seafarers on OSVs or their replacement with low cost seafarers on scandalous rates of pay as low as £2 per hour – some 70 per cent below the value of the National Living Wage of £7.20 per hour. "MPs are to be congratulated for highlighting this scandal and the Shipping Minister cannot continue to walk on by as thousands of UK seafarers lose their jobs as a direct result of his government’s failure to get a grip on an industry that is jeopardising jobs, skills and revenue from our oil and gas reserves,” he said. Early day motion 231 NON-PAYMENT OF NATIONAL LIVING WAGE AND SEAFARER EMPLOYMENT ON OFFSHORE SUPPLY VESSELS Primary sponsor: Ian Mearns MP That this House is concerned by ongoing job losses, alleged visa abuses and low pay in the offshore supply vessel (OSV) sector which services the UK oil and gas industry in the North Sea; notes that the downturn in oil prices since August 2014 has led to over 1,000 job losses amongst UK seafarers on OSVs, in many cases being replaced by non-EEA seafarers on rates of pay as low as £2 per hour; is further concerned that seafarer ratings replaced by low-cost foreign crews in the OSV sector will be lost to the maritime industry; believes that this practice puts UK seafarers and the national economy at an unfair disadvantage, particularly in the event of an increase in oil prices; further notes that the number of UK owned OSVs fell by 10 per cent in the year to 31 December 2015; is concerned that a record number of OSVs are currently laid up in UK ports, in some cases with non-EEA crew living on board in contravention of transit visa requirements and the Maritime Labour Convention (MLC); and calls on the Government to enforce visa and employment law and the MLC in the OSV sector as a matter of urgency.