Solitaire "refuses to pay its staff the minimum wage"

national | worker & community struggles and protests | news report Wednesday June 24, 2009 04:04 by PQ

The world's largest pipe laying ship, the MV Solitaire, will arrive back in Irish waters this week.
It has emerged that the operators of the ship do not pay the minimum rate of pay for Ireland, as the ship is registered under a Panamanian flag of convenience.

Allseas, the ship's owners, is a company registered in Zurich, Switzerland.

Shell, the operator of the Corrib pipeline project, is based in Aberdeen, Scotland (although there are offices in The Hague and in London), but the Solitaire flies a Panamanian flag and according to a Parlimentary Question asked last year, "refuses to pay its staff the minimum wage"

The Minister for Sellouts, Eamon Ryan, answered a request to make a statement on the situation with the following:

"As Minister for Communications, Energy and Natural Resources I have no statutory function in this matter. I understand that the payment of wages on foreign flagged ships is a matter for the flag state where the ship is registered and for the internal domestic laws of that country."

So that's all right then.