International Chamber of Shipping sets out industry principles to combat harassment and bullying
The International Chamber of Shipping (ICS) has published a guide to combat and eliminate harassment and bullying in the maritime sector.
The free industry guidance sets out five high level and eight detailed principles to address the issue.
ICS submitted the principles to shipping’s global UN regulators, the International Labour Organization (ILO) and the International Maritime Organization (IMO), ahead of a joint meeting alongside governments, shipowners and unions.
Among the new suite of principles are the need for individual companies to clearly define and communicate what harassment and bullying means for them, including examples of behaviours that constitute these actions. The principles also emphasise the value of establishing clear and unambiguous company complaints management procedures that cover the shoreside and all shipboard departments with a dedicated complaints manager assigned as investigator to each of these groups.
In a separate paper to be considered at the upcoming ILO/IMO meeting, ICS emphasises that company policies and initiatives alone will not suffice to address the issue, adding that the maritime sector’s ability to successfully combat harassment and bullying also depends highly on the effectiveness of collaboration between governments, shipowners’ and seafarers’ representatives (unions), including to promote positive cultures on board.
“While shipowners are responsible for implementing shipboard policies and complementary measures to eliminate harassment and bullying from ships, national governments and seafarers’ unions also have important roles to play. Unions can raise awareness and set expectations for their members, including appropriate deterrents, while all states should review their national civil and criminal codes to verify consistency with requirements of ILO’s Maritime Labour Convention and Violence and Harassment Convention, both of which apply to the maritime secto,” commented Tim Springett, chair of the ICS labour affairs committee.
The Seafarers’ International Union of Canada (SIU) recently published a report on workplace harassment and bullying within the Canadian marine sector, which indicated that 46% of seafarers have experienced harassment or bullying at some point in their career as a seafarer.
Last year, the Center for Maritime Health and Society (CMSS) at the University of Southern Denmark held a similar investigation looking at the extent of harassment and bullying on Danish ships on behalf of the Danish Maritime Authority.
The investigation found that approximately 17% of the respondents experienced bullying at their workplace, while 11% had been exposed to harassment.
