Union complains of Filipino-crewed ship working in Canada

INQUIRER.net US Bureau, November 26, 2016

SAN FRANCISCO – A controversy is brewing in Victoria over the presence in Canadian waters of a ship crewed by ten British officers and 29 Filipino seafarers.

A British company called Global Marine Systems has kept a ship, the Wave Venture, anchored at the pier for four years, its crew repairing underwater cables in Canadian waters. But it’s not Canadians doing the work.

“The biggest concern that we have with her, quite simply, it is a foreign crew, on a foreign flagged vessel doing jobs that Canadians can do,” Peter Lahay of the International Transport Workers Federation told Cheknews.ca. “This vessel is chartered to Rogers Communication.”

The union representing seafarers, the International Longshore and Warehouse Union, based in Vancouver, learned of the ship’s presence in Victoria only recently, said union President President Rob Ashton.

U.K.-based Global Marine Systems, which has been operating ships at Ogden Point for 27 years, is allowed to use foreign workers due to a waiver granted them by the federal government.

A foreign seafarer can make as little as $1.26 an hour or as much as three or four bucks an hour. Where Canadian wages are $20-plus, depending on which company you work for, according to a union member.

An employment contract obtained by the International Transport Workers Federation details the salary for the crew members: 191 regular hours pays out $482 dollars per month; with an overtime rate of $3.15 an hour.

“In this case it’s a 44 hour work week and 85 fixed hours overtime per month. That means that the seafarer has to work 276 hours per month in order to earn his basic salary. In this case, it works out to about a thousand dollars a month,” an ITWF official told Cheknews.ca, “there’s fifty jobs on this ship.”

The union worries that the federal government will allow more ships like this in Canadian waters. Now a second vessel, the Cable Innovator, is in Victoria to replace the Wave Venture.

Read more: http://globalnation.inquirer.net/150104/union-complains-filipino-crewed-ship-working-canada#ixzz4RWEDoWR4
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