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Q&A: Shipping Still At Sea

Interview with David Cockroft, Int'l Transport Workers' Federation

ROME, Sep 3 2007 (IPS) - A first officer&#39s certificate to navigate a ship and deputise for captain. No training, no skills. Price, 4,500 dollars. David Cockroft sent shock waves through the shipping business when he bought that certificate back in 2001 to show corruption in shipping registries.

Cockroft&#39s campaign to protect seafarers and promote the shipping industry has continued since then. In an interview with IPS in 2004, the British champion of seafarers worldwide spoke of his efforts to counter the negative effects of U.S. legislation introduced after Sep. 11, 2001. And that was not the last of the challenges. Now he has taken up the environmental issue after Secretary-General of the International Maritime Organisation (IMO) Efthimios E. Mitropoulos declared that environment is the main issue facing maritime transport today.

IPS Editor-in-Chief Miren Gutierrez spoke to Cockroft, now Secretary-General of the International Transport Workers&#39 Federation, ahead of World Maritime Day, Sep. 27.

IPS: You have been the ITF Secretary-General since 1994 and outlived four consecutive congresses, the last one in Durban. What has changed in the world of seafarers since you started, and with the Flags of Convenience (a foreign flag under which a vessel is registered in order to reduce operating costs and avoid regulations)?

David Cockroft: The world of seafarers has changed a great deal since 1994, and so has the ITF. We have strengthened our global presence in defence of seafarers rights in ports all over the world so that substandard ship owners know that there is a growing chance that an ITF union somewhere will provide support for exploited seafarers. At the same time we have established a strong dialogue with decent ship owners and managers who have an interest in maintaining standards.

When I attended my first ITF Congress as General Secretary in Geneva in 1994, there were fewer than 2,000 Flag of Convenience (FOC) ships under ITF agreement – and the number was falling. Today there are more than 8,000 and rising. And more than half of those ships are covered by the world&#39s first globally bargained collective agreement within the framework of the International Bargaining Forum.

Of course, the other major change in the world of seafarers is that they are currently in very short supply. The number of cases of exploitation and abandonment of seafarers has fallen drastically, but not because ship owners have all suddenly become paragons of virtue, but because freight rates are at a historical peak due to the continued growth of export/import based economies, particularly China.

Skilled seafarers at present can virtually name their own salaries. Everyone connected with the industry knows that this cannot go on for ever. At some stage there will be a major downturn and suddenly – as previously – there will be a glut of tonnage chasing a declining market.

The ITF&#39s job is to ensure that we have in place the best possible conditions for seafarers so that they do not pay the price for the current rush to invest in new ship building.

But the most important factor of all which will affect seafarers is the adoption by the ILO (International Labour Organisation) last year of the Consolidated Maritime Labour Convention. This unique international standard adopted by the major maritime nations and representatives of ship owners and seafarers constitutes the Seafarers&#39 Bill of Rights.

Incorporating most of the many maritime labour standards which were adopted by the ILO since its foundation in 1919 the MLC will take its place as the fourth pillar of international maritime regulation alongside the Safety, Training and Pollution standards of the IMO, but covering social conditions on board ship. When it comes into force probably in 2009-10 it will be the first ILO standard which is enforceable by port states – whether or not the flag state concerned has ratified or applied it. And ITF inspectors, working alongside the state port state control inspectors, and the representatives of maritime missions and other seafarer welfare bodies will make sure that every seafarer is aware of what their rights are.

IPS: And since you got your First Officer&#39s Certificate from Panama in 2001? Is this industry still an "under-policed system that encourages bad operators to undercut good ones"? Have abuses permitted by flags of convenience decreased at all? What about fraudulent qualifications?

DC: As far as my Panamanian certificate is concerned, it certainly hit the headlines. In fact I visited Panama in 2005 and gave my seamen&#39s book to newly elected Vice-President (Rubén) Arosemena so he could investigate the corrupt practices which produced the certificate. We are still waiting for a reply but it is a lot harder (and more expensive) to get a fake certificate from the Panamanian (and other) authorities than it was in 2000.

The principles which led to the establishment of the ITF&#39s flag of convenience campaign almost 60 years ago have not gone away. The idea that ship registers are a business rather than a public responsibility and that owners can scour the world in search of the cheapest and most convenient nationality is still a bad one. But things have changed here too.

Firstly two major FOC states – Cyprus and Malta – have joined the European Union and have begun to apply international standards to their ships more rigorously. Secondly there are a growing number of genuine national flags which are beginning to adopt FOC like conditions and where a growing number of ships are neither owned by nationals of the state nor crewed according to national conditions. There is a growing tendency in some regions to use the system to impose social dumping even on ships engaged in ferry services and short sea shipping. The ITF is currently reviewing its policies to make sure we can cope fully with them.

The exploitative practices have decreased in the short term but primarily because of the high growth rate of the industry. They will still be there when the downturn comes, and the ITF will be waiting.

IPS: At the beginning of the year, the case of trade unionist Pedro Zamora, shot down in Guatemala by unidentified gunmen, shocked the world. Other unionists in the industry have received threats or are in prison. Is this the kind of threat facing unionists today?

DC: The Pedro Zamora assassination was a great shock to ITF unions around the world as many of them knew him personally and had been directly involved in supporting his campaign against the corrupt privatisation of Puerto Quetzal. They were also shocked by the total lack of interest by the police and the authorities in Guatemala who treated his murder as if it was quite normal. Unfortunately in Guatemala – and in other countries in the region, led by Colombia – it is quite normal for union officers to be targeted for elimination.

We look forward to Guatemala – post the September elections – taking this whole case and the general treatment of union officers much more seriously. The ITF will not let this case rest until his murderers are brought to justice and until the atmosphere of fear and intimidation which still surrounds his union leaders, who are receiving death threats on a regular basis, is ended.

I am afraid that we receive reports of this kind of attack somewhere in central America almost every week. Our job is to make it very clear to those responsible that the people they target have very strong and powerful friends around the world.

IPS: The 5.25 billion dollar expansion of the Panama Canal has created a lot of controversy. Its critics say that the expansion will actually cost more than expected, will not bring in the promised riches, and has been agreed without the explicit agreement of the industry, its clients, who may or may not agree to fare increases. What do you think from the perspective of the seafarers and the ITF?

DC: In principle, infrastructure investment which encourages growth in the shipping industry should be good for seafarers globally. We have no evidence that any of the ITF&#39s affiliated unions in Panama or the ITF seafarers&#39 or dockers&#39 sections have been consulted about this major programme or that the major shipping industry bodies have been involved too. It is a high risk strategy but it needs to be both in the interests of shipping and of the people of Panama. At the moment, we don&#39t have enough information to be able to judge whether it will be good for seafarers.

IPS: In a previous interview with IPS, in 2004, you denounced the negative effects of the security measures introduced by the United States after the attacks on the World Trade Centre in 2001. "The criminalisation of seafarers" was then "the biggest issue we face at the moment," you said. Has anything changed in these three years?

DC: The criminalisation of seafarers has got worse in the last three years, or certainly that is how it is perceived by them, which is what counts. We also have the growing requirement by many countries, including the U.S., for seafarers to have visas both for shore leave and for transit to and from the vessel.

But the biggest problem is the tendency of some countries to seek to prosecute for environmental crimes seafarers who have made an honest mistake and to move to the strict application of criminal law, without the normal elements of intention, knowledge or recklessness. In such conditions, it is hardly surprising that we face a growing shortage of suitably qualified seafarers. The increasingly difficult conditions being faced by seafarers and fishers are outlined in the ITF publication &#39Out of Sight Out of Mind&#39 which gives concrete examples of human rights violations and examples of criminalisation, denial of shore leave, and abandonment.

IPS: World seaborne trade increased by around 135 percent between 1985 and 2006, whereas estimates of the quantity of oil spilled during the same period show a steady reduction by 85 percent. According to the IMO, of all modes of transport, shipping is the least environmentally damaging. Even so, its Secretary-General says that environment is the main issue facing maritime transport today. He says ratification of the IMO&#39s environmental conventions is key to tackling this problem. Do you agree that this is the main problem today for the industry?

DC: Environment is the major question for every policy maker today, and in particular global warming. I am not sure that oil spills are a major factor in climate change and, as you say, all the evidence is that the situation is improving. The problem, which we already saw with the Erika and the Prestige as well as with other ships we have been involved with, is that oil pollution is very popular in the press. Bulk carriers can sink in mid-ocean with the loss of all hands and hardly anyone except the families notices. When a tanker leaks a bit of oil it is big news.

Even now the European Commission is getting a bit too enthusiastic about enforcing ship-based pollution measures which will cost a lot of money and will impose increasing workloads on seafarers who are already operating with the minimum safe manning. In reality short sea shipping rather than road freight is a major contributor to reducing carbon emissions. Shipping should be seen as a solution and not a problem.

IPS: In comparison, how serious is discrimination, sexual, racial, religious or of different nature? And abandoned ships and crews, such as that of the Enxembre, which was detained recently in Scotland because of serious safety issues, and originated a pay dispute?

DC: Discrimination and abandonment are still a problem although nothing like as bad as it was and will be when market conditions worsen. Ship owners still think they have all the bargaining power when their crews are far from home, and they can keep their wages for long periods and kick them off the ship or change flag if the crew demand any rights. The Enxembre is a good example of the worst regulated and most dangerous industry on earth – fishing. That is why this year we also saw the adoption of a Consolidated Fisheries Convention within the ILO which will apply to fishing vessels in a similar way to how the MLC applies to merchant vessels.

But we know that IUU (Illegal, Unreported and Unregulated) fishing is a major problem in many parts of the world where the conditions faced by fishing vessel crews make merchant ships look good by comparison.

IPS: What about climate change? Are its effects already apparent in the industry? If so, how does it affect maritime safety? Climate change could affect shipping in other crucial ways, for example, making it possible to open new maritime routes.

DC: As I said above, climate change is a lot more important for shipping than oil pollution. If it opens up new shipping routes in the far North, it will probably be bad news for the Panama Canal. At present though, the main task has to be to limit the effects of climate change rather than taking advantage of it.