They are the pariahs of the high seas. They exist in many cases outside the law. The profits of their proprietors take absolute precedence over the conditions of those who work on them. They are the "flags of convenience" ships, where the naked greed of their owners rules supreme, writes Mary Raftery.
Irish Ferries is in the process of embracing full membership of this club. Already one of its passenger ferries, the MV Normandy, no longer flies an Irish flag. It was re-registered under the flag of the Bahamas earlier this year. And now, the last remaining Irish-owned passenger ship company is turning its back fully on the Irish flag, making it clear that it intends to re-register all of its ferries elsewhere.
The Bahamas is one of those countries which makes itself available to companies which no longer wish to abide by their own national labour law. The UN Convention on the Law of the Sea states in Article 91 that there must be a "genuine link" between the ownership of a ship and the country where it is registered. There is clearly no link of the kind envisaged in that article between Irish passenger ferries and the Bahamas. Further, the fact that both Ireland and the Bahamas are signatories to this convention has not deterred Irish Ferries in its bid to detach itself from all Irish and EU law designed to protect those who earn their living on Irish ships.
Workers in Irish Ferries have until next Monday to decide whether they will accept either redundancy or a slashing of their pay by up to 50 per cent in some cases and the removal of their legal entitlements to annual leave or even days off, including weekends.
Minimum wage, statutory entitlements to leave, working time directives - none of these will apply anymore to Irish Ferries. With the shiny new flags of convenience, be they from the Bahamas or elsewhere, all protection for employees is gone forever.
The Irish Ferries plan is to force out its Irish workers and replace them with cheap labour, probably from eastern Europe. Employing people on 12-hour shifts, seven days a week at around €3.50 an hour is necessary, the company claims, to guarantee continuing profitability.
Its tactics have been brutal. It has refused to negotiate or allow any third-party mediation. It has threatened that industrial action will result in a withdrawal of its voluntary redundancy offer of weeks' pay per year of service, leaving workers with either just the bare statutory minimum of two weeks' pay (per year of service), or the wretched salary and conditions on offer if they decide to remain.
The company has rejected out of hand the recommendations of the consultants which both it and the unions involved had agreed would analyse options for cutting costs. The consultants' report, finalised last week, suggested among other measures a 5 per cent salary cut for Irish Ferries directors and senior managers.
However, it now transpires that the company had little interest in this exercise. It has been reported that weeks before the consultants produced their report, Irish Ferries was already seeking to recruit cheap foreign labour to replace the Irish staff they are now laying off.
You might think from all of this that Irish Ferries was in dire financial straits, about to go to the wall unless drastic action was taken. The reality, however, is otherwise. The company has reported substantial profits for a number of years. While its passenger business has declined on the British routes, this has been more than offset by an increase in its freight operations. And, crucially, its market share in both the passenger and freight areas on the British lines has remained stable.
Irish Ferries has availed of generous tax breaks available in the country whose flag it now casts aside. The introduction of the tonnage tax scheme has saved the company millions in tax. Irish Ferries had threatened to remove its entire operation out of Ireland unless such a scheme was implemented by the Government.
In 1991, when the semi-state B&I Line was privatised and sold to Irish Continental Group (ICG, the parent company of Irish Ferries), certain guarantees were given to the government. Séamus Brennan, then minister for transport, told the Dáil that ICG had undertaken to maintain the ships "under the Irish flag". He added that it remained committed to "the maintenance of vital Irish shipping/maritime skills".
The privatisation was highly controversial at the time, with Fine Gael accusing the Government of giving away B&I at a rock-bottom price. But at least some of these solemn guarantees allayed fears that such a vital service as our sea connections could be hijacked by unscrupulous private interests.
Irish Ferries has now both flagrantly taken steps which are outside its employee labour agreements, and has made a mockery of commitments given to government. Meanwhile, the country is stripped of its ships and its maritime skills - and our seafarers of their jobs. And despite Bertie's strong words in the Dáil yesterday, so far the same Government has stood by, wringing its hands, "like a bystander at a mugging", in the words of one trade union official.