SIPTU serves strike notice on Irish Ferries
Relationships between SIPTU and Irish Ferries took a further nosedive yesterday after a Filipino woman had her contract to work on board the Isle of Inishmore cancelled after media reports highlighted her poor pay conditions.
Salvacion Orge, 44, who started work as a beauty therapist on the Rosslare-Pembroke route on Wednesday, was informed that the firm had decided to withdraw the service.
It emerged that Ms Orge was hired through a Singapore-based recruitment agency, Sharp Management, to work for Irish Ferries on a monthly salary of €354 well below national minimum wage levels. Her contract also obliged her to work 12 hours a day, seven days a week with only three days' holiday per month.
"The payment of this kind of slave wage is exactly what we predicted would happen if Irish Ferries got their way on outsourcing," said SIPTU official Paul Smyth.
He claimed Irish Ferries attempted to distance the company from the hiring agency, even though it ultimately took the decision to try and remove her from the ship.
Ms Orge has refused to leave the Isle of Inishmore until the problem is resolved.
Ms Orge said she felt extremely vulnerable as she feared the agency would no longer wish to employ her if she was forced to return to the Philippines.
No spokesperson for Irish Ferries could be contacted for comment yesterday. However, it is understood that the firm has informed union officials that nobody is available to deal with the matter until next Tuesday.
Ms Orge remained on board the Isle of Inishmore last night after it docked in Rosslare.
The move to serve strike notice on Irish Ferries followed a ballot by ships officers who voted overwhelmingly in favour of industrial action to highlight workers' anger at the decision to outsource crew on its Rosslare to Cherbourg route.
A meeting of crew members next week is expected to decide when and what form the industrial action will take after the company was formally given two weeks' statutory notice last night.
Meanwhile, new statistics show that passenger numbers on Irish Sea ferries last year fell by 3% overall. A total of 3.6 million people travelled on the six main sea routes between the Republic and Britain in 2004 down about 200,000 on the figures for the previous year.
Services out of Rosslare had a mixed 2004, with passenger numbers on Stena crossings to Fishguard up 14% to 614,000, while there was a 17% drop to a total of 378,000 on the Pembroke route served by Irish Ferries.
Dublin-Holyhead remained the busiest route on the Irish Sea with almost 1.38 million passengers last year an increase of 3%. Numbers travelling on the second busiest route, Dun Laoghaire-Holyhead, fell by 12% to just under 900,000 passengers.
The Cork-Swansea service also recorded a slight decrease in business down 2% to a total of 116,000 passengers.
Traffic on routes between the North and Britain also fell by 12% last year to 2.5m passengers.
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