Question to the Department for Transport:

To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, what recent assessment he has made of the effects of the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea on the practice of nationality-based pay differentials in the (a) UK, (b) European and (c) international shipping industry.

Issues relating to the practice of nationality based differential pay and UNCLOS are being considered by the Post Implementation Review of the Equality Act 2010 (Work on Ships and Hovercraft) Regulations 2011 which is due to complete by the autumn of 2016.

Under UNCLOS, coastal States do not interfere in the ‘internal economy’ of foreign flagged ships on innocent passage in their territorial waters. However, seafarers have a range of potential employment protection where they work, or ordinarily work, in the United Kingdom. In a recent case the Court held that this applies to seafarers working from a base situated in Great Britain, even if they are employed on a non-UK flagged ship, and that ship spends most of its time outside Great Britain.