Question to the Department for Transport:

To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, what sanctions are in place to prevent the practice of nationality-based pay discrimination against EEA seafarers employed on (a) UK and (b) non-UK registered vessels working from UK ports.

The Equality Act 2010 (Work on Ships and Hovercraft) Regulations 2011 makes clear that it is an offence to offer to pay or pay a person who is a national of an EEA State, or of a designated State (as defined in the Regulations), at a different rate based on that person’s nationality, where the seafarer is working wholly or partly in Great Britain and its adjacent waters and is working on a UK or EEA registered vessel.

Similar legislation is applied in Northern Ireland.