Plea for help from fishing vessel “named and shamed” in global abuse report

Burmese crew mem­bers aboard the fish­ing ves­sel “Sky 75” in the Port of Timaru have approached unions with a plea for help, a day after their ves­sel was “named and shamed” in an inter­na­tion­al report.

The fish­ing ves­sel “Sky 75” was fea­tured as a spe­cif­ic exam­ple of crew abuse in an inter­na­tion­al report from the Inter­na­tion­al Trans­port Work­ers’ Fed­er­a­tion (ITF) that was pre­sent­ed to a Unit­ed Nations meet­ing on mar­itime law that opened in New York yes­ter­day.

New Zealand ITF co-ordi­na­tor Kathy Whe­lan says the “Sky 75” is a repeat offend­er, and the ves­sel had already come to the atten­tion of the ITF when 10 Indone­sian crew left the Kore­an reg­is­tered fish­ing ves­sel ‘Sky 75’ in the Port of Nel­son in Sep­tem­ber 2005.

“We find it amaz­ing that after all the pub­lic­i­ty and all the promis­es of action after that inci­dent, the same ves­sel has turned up with sim­i­lar prob­lems.”

She says a let­ter from crew mem­bers asked for help with their con­di­tions of employ­ment.

Crew say they are owed two months wages and they have been work­ing on aver­age 20 hours a day, when their agree­ment spec­i­fies 8 hours per day, and no over­time mon­ey had been received.

The let­ter from the Burmese crew says that the Kore­an offi­cers aboard the “Sky 75” had threat­ened abuse against the crew and ordered them to work by kick­ing them with their boots and hit­ting with sticks.

The cost of safe­ty and work­ing equip­ment was deduct­ed from their salaries, and meals were insuf­fi­cient and irreg­u­lar.

The “Sky 75” is oper­at­ed by the New Zealand com­pa­ny Posei­don, based in Hamil­ton.

The crew have also asked the Port Author­i­ty to look at con­cerns they have about the sea­wor­thi­ness of the ves­sel.

Ms Whe­lan says the ITF will be inves­ti­gat­ing the prob­lems onboard the ves­sel and have asked for a Depart­ment of Labour inspec­tion.

She says that Third World con­di­tions are becom­ing the norm in parts of the New Zealand fish­ing indus­try, with the indus­try unwill­ing or unable to fix the prob­lems.

“The answer lies in prop­er reg­u­la­tion of the indus­try and seri­ous enforce­ment of the law, not in nego­ti­at­ing deals with rogue ele­ments in the fish­ing indus­try.”

She says the Mar­itime Union has approached the Depart­ment of Labour to gain infor­ma­tion on the “Sky 75” under the Offi­cial Infor­ma­tion Act.