What has the ETF been up to?
P&O Ferries | Governments should stand up and protect the rights of their citizens and oppose lawbreaking multinationals, pointed out ETF GS, Livia Spera, one year after the P&O Ferries mass sacking of UK seafarers.
MERITIME TRANSPORT
Section Meeting | Happy to have met the representatives of our affiliates in Brussels last month for our Section meeting. We concluded our discussions by adopting the Rules of Procedure and planning the 1st ETF Young Seafarer meeting for 29 June. We are glad to have also prepared the Sectoral Social Dialogue Committee meeting.
#IWD2023 | NO to sexism, gender discrimination, gender stereotypes, bullying, harassment and unequal treatment was our key message for 8 March. With our social partner, ECSA, we organized an online live event to discuss gender equity in shipping. We must continue to work together to strengthen the social dialogue further.
No more P&Os! |
- A year after the illegal sacking of 786 P&O seafarers in the UK, the ETF PO for Maritime Transport, Nikolaos Koletsis, joined the RMT protest in London to make it clear that another P&O Ferries can never happen again!
- The race to the bottom in transport must be stopped, and governments should oppose lawbreaking multinationals, stated the ETF GS, Livia Spera, in a joint ITF-ITF press release.
- We stood in solidarity with our UK affiliates fighting to prevent such a case from happening again. In one voice, we said: Never Forgive and Never Forget!
Upcoming events:
Skill Sea Project – final conference – 31 May 2023 – Brussels| BE
European Shipping Summit 2023 –19-20 September 2023 – Brussels| BE
DOCKERS
Section Meeting | We held our annual section meeting in Valencia |Spain. Main highlights:
- Labour pool systems are an efficient form of labour organization ensuring social protection and job retention, as proven by their successful functioning in Belgium, Italy and Spain
- Safety is a condition of lashing operations being done only by dockers! As shown in a dedicated roundtable, working methods may differ from one country to another, but one condition stays the same: lashing is dockers’ work.
- We said goodbye to Monique Verbeek, a legendary figure of ETF and ITF dockers’ world, a remarkable woman, and a fearless fighter for dockers’ rights. Thank you, Monique, for your exceptional work and for being an inspiration for over 40 years. At her retirement, we promised her we would continue her work.
Work of a stevedore | Thank you, Jorge Garcia, from CCOO Estiba España, for standing up when no one else did in front of false/ unstained media attacks and being straightforward on how the selection processes of stevedores are actually running.
Upcoming events:
“Women in Port & Maritime Sector. Why not” international conference – 17 -18 May – Livorno|