The International Transport Workers’ Federation (ITF) and the International Shipping Federation today jointly issued the following news release:ITF and ISF hail adoption of seafarers’ labour standards in new ILO ‘Superconvention’
The ITF for the world’s seafarers and the ISF for shipowners today hailed the adoption by the International Labour Conference in Geneva of a consolidated maritime labour convention.
The ‘Superconvention’ or ‘Seafarers’ Bill of Rights’ was adopted moments ago by an overwhelming vote of 314 votes for, none against, with just four abstentions, at the closing session of a conference which brought together more than 1000 government, shipowner and seafarer representatives from over 100 countries for the past three weeks in Geneva. It is the culmination of five years of intensive work to produce a single international social instrument which will be accepted as the ‘fourth pillar’ of the international regulatory system for the global maritime industry, along with the safety (SOLAS), training (STCW), and pollution (MARPOL) conventions of the International maritime Organization (IMO).
International Transport Workers’ Federation General Secretary David Cockroft described its adoption as “A historic result for the ILO, showing that what has long been a global industry needs global regulation which will be enforced in practice at sea and in the world’s ports.” Chris Horrocks, Secretary General of the International Shipping Federation, said, “This landmark decision is just the beginning. Now we have to ensure that every government ratifies this Convention as soon as possible and applies it in full.”
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