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The International Labour Organization (ILO) has started considering a draft
convention on maritime labour standards which will consolidate and modernise
a large number existing, and in many cases widely ignored, ILO conventions
on seafarers’ conditions.
The 10th maritime session of the International Labour Conference will run
from today through 23 February.
Such maritime sessions are held only every 10 years, while the ILO’s annual
labour conference meets every year.
An ILO statement says that the convention, if adopted, will represent the
“most sweeping and comprehensive global legal instrument ever forged
regarding the world’s shipowners, seafarers and maritime nations”.
While there is considerable optimism that a convention will result from the
conference it by no means a foregone conclusion.
There are still important and sensitive issues unresolved, including the
definition of a “seafarer”.
Moreover the nature of the ILO process means that even though a huge amount
of very detailed drafting work has gone on for over four years it is still
possible for any of the participants to raise new issues or object to
something that has previously been regarded as agreed.
Nevertheless the betting among those involved seems to be that a convention
will be adopted, partly because all sides are loathe to see so much hard
work go to waste.
Delegates elected top French transport official Jean-Marc Schindler as
President of the Conference while the vice presidents are Dierk Lindemann,
Brian Orrell and Tatsuya Teranishi representing respectively owners,
seafarers and governments.
Delegates to the Conference are to consider a new, single “framework
Convention” on maritime labour standards that consolidates and updates more
than 65 international maritime labour standards adopted since the ILO was
founded in 1919.
Schindler characterised the meeting as “a new and unique event in the
history of this organisation” and said the convention marked “the first
attempt to create the global instrument for a specific sector of industry”.
He also referred to the two major principles of the Convention, allowing
ratifying governments discretion as to the way in which they implement the
seafarers’ rights, but setting out firm obligations on governments to
respect those rights, backed up by a detailed enforcement system to ensure
that the Convention’s provisions are respected. |
