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It is not just the Ship owners it is also the Politicians, who are supposed to look after all our interests but sell out to Europe. We are now just a small province of Europe, we have ceased to be a Nation and so we cannot decide who sails on the last few of our ships. When they have all gone so will we have.
After 2000 years we have become nothing. Fool Britannia.
Brian........on the last of the Scotch before that is made in the Filipines.
Might be cheaper when it is from the Philippines , will be smaller though , There will be more of it , and it will last two years without needing to be replaced
In Feb 1991 I wote in the letters column of the Telegraph, and some of the exerts from this may be approp. to this post. " 4. I would like to see that with the updating of tonnage that the operating company is forced to keep vessels in an efficient mode, and would suggest an inspection by an outside authority at more frequent intervals.
5.......are on station is 28 days - which more often than not exceeds this by a much larger amount. I believe this should be reduced, especially in winter to a maxinum of 3 weeks.I also believe the efficiency and awareness of crews is much reduced after this time. Offshore workers generally work on a two week cycle, and do not work/sleep as close to the enviroment as seafarers." There were 7 points I pointed out, too much to print here. And finally" Although I am not a tub thumping trade unionist I would like to see them have some say in the welfare and and conditions of seafarers themselves in the Industry ( no owner will accept this if he can avoid it)" a few more bits and pieces blah blah. I was vocal at times re. conditions etc. and do not have a very high estimation of some shipowners. However after saying that, it is like hitting your head against a brick wall. Going back to the relative likes and dislikes of unions, they to my mind were an absolute necessity in some cases, as was the only ones the shipowner was afraid of. Cheers John Sabourn
Cannot comment on the TV program as we did not get it here in Oz. But from talks with amny crew members on a number of cruise ships it would appear that this lot are realy doing the Philipinos in. Most I have spoken to are very happy with wages and conditions on the cruise ships pointing out to me that they are often earning up to 15 times what they could earn at home. They all appear happy with the six month contracts, some opting for ten month ones. But as you say there will always be some who will undercut their grannys if they think there would be q uid in it for them.
The Unions in the nineteen seventies struck a great deal with the ferry companies , in return for a 24 hour duty period , I got 48 hours off , The 24 hours was around 12 hours work , six hours sleep in broken two - three hour segments , The 48 hours was off the ship . This meant that there were three running crews of officers , making five crews in total due to leave and two and a half crews of ratings working seven days of 4 on eight off watches . The money was not too bad , but let us face it , it was a great deal . Mrs Thatcher sold Sealink out to Mr James Sherwood , an American friend for what was probably the value of the land at Parkstone Quay and the other assets at Holyhead . The ships were not a valuable asset and some were actually owned by Lloyd's leasing . She ( Mrs Thatcher ) probably did the sensible thing . I would have preferred James Fisher & Sons to have been the successful bidder , and I got out at the first chance , with a very interesting Union negotiated severance package . The legacy of that company is Stena , the company featured in the program , a private company with a £ 9.5 billion revenue and 6,000 employees . The featured ship in the first Part was the Stena Mersey which is registered at Belfast The Harwich Hoek ships are UK and Dutch registered . The competition on this stretch of the coast , used to have the Diesel subsidised as the Brittany Ferries were originally owned by a French Farming consortium and attracted a fuel subsidy . The tunnel was going to kill off the short sea services and the Western channel , It did not services are still there , the Red duster still flies off the stern , but the manning is no longer men of these shores . We let it happen , in an effort to keep a Merchant Service we changed the rules on flags to appease shipowners , the NUS died , in I believe a suicidal manner , killed by its own officials , the excellent MNAOA slipped away silently , the successive governments never gave a damn .So a poor Philippine steward at $3 an hour for an 11 hour day for six months no day off , doing exactly what time aboard we would have delighted in forty years ago , manages to earn $5000 for his time on board . A British seafarer under the same conditions would require four times that , Do I blame Stena , No ! , I like my ferry crossing , mainly with LD lines to be as cheap as possible , so I turn a blind eye to the nationality of the crew , and look at the cost of my ticket . My knife is there in the back of the British Seaman . We had a good deal , too good to survive , would I have taken a pay cut and longer hours in 1986 when this ball started rolling , well I did not . P & O ferries , so British sounding name is part of Dubai World .
As I have said before , will the last seaman to leave the Merchant Navy please turn the light out ... Whoops Why is it so dark in here
I wonder just how far exploitaion of the worker goes in UK. Last time I was there, admitedly a few years ago, Sainsburys had a notice in the window,
'Checkout assistants required 2 ponds per hour' That was equivalent to baout $4 Oz per hour. At that time the minimum wage here in Oz was about $10 per hour. Do you now have a legislated minimum wage rate?
john here in the UK we are supposed to have our own little community EU were we supposed to look after each other share our industries like a happy family so how the hell do we get most of our needs outside the EU at a cheaper price than Europe can offer we are knocking nails in our own coffin and the EU is standing still its a stupid way to think we are helping each other its a nonsense of a club we are in and we are throwing money at each other so we can get deeper in debt????jp
Current NMW rates
There are different levels of NMW, depending on your age and whether you are an apprentice. The current rates (from 1 October 2011) are:
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Past NMW rates can be viewed on the Low Pay Commission website.
Rates from 1 October 2012
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- £4.98 - the 18-20 rate
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You are entitled to the NMW even if you sign a contract agreeing to be paid at a lower rate. This is regardless of whether you sign of your own free will or because your employer persuades or makes you. The contract will have no legal effect and you must still be paid the proper rate.
Now reading that , I don't actually see an exemption for foreign crews on British registered ships from the minimum wage regulations , but i bet there is one , Agency workers are not exempt , btthe self employed are .
I read somewhere that any idiot can now command a "British" ship, provided they have some kind of Mickey Mouse ticket. In other, better times, only a British National with British Certificate was eligible, the only exception was somebody who had given service to the Crown in Wartime. I have seen ships registered in places that were uninhabited islands, McDermotts apparently bought an Island so they made their own regulations to suit! Half the Coast Guard has been, or is in the process of closure, Lighthouses extinguished, buoys removed, paper charts scrapped etc. What will happen when the next war starts? GPS sats shot down, nobody on the bridge that even knows how to steer or navigate, all this having been done on computer by an office girl. The majority population here will revert back to cannibalism to survive, roll on the multicultural multi faith empowered remnants of the British race surviving on CHOC ICES!
:banghead:
Hi Graham, you are not allowed to say....CHOC ICES!
A footballer has just been in Court accused of saying.......CHOC ICES! to another football player of a darker shade of skin.:p
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. To get back, I signed on an AB and when I went through his discharge book he had several discharges as `Master` . I said Hey Eddie how do you do it?` he said he went to the Panamanian Embassy and bought a Masters ticket for £50. He showed it to me, a beautiful piece of manuscript.
Cheers
Brian