Probe into island abandonment of periwinkle pickers

An employer who left 13 eastern European periwinkle pickers stranded on an island has serious questions to answer, a politician said tonight.

A probe was launched into the circumstances in which the 13 workers, believed to be mostly Latvian, had to be rescued from an island off the coast of Dublin.

The stranded periwinkle pickers were rescued late on Saturday night after the person who was due to pick them up failed to return to the uninhabited island.

Green Party leader Trevor Sargent, a Dublin North TD, said it appeared to be an exploitative type of situation.

“The person responsible for it needs to be seriously questioned as to their motivation and knowledge of labour law, over their sense of responsibility to people in their employment. It has all the tragic connotations of the Morecambe Bay disaster,” he said.

Last year, around 21 Chinese cockle pickers died in the freezing waters of Morecambe Bay in Lancashire in the UK after they were trapped by rising tides.

Mr Sargent said: “The person seems not to have learned, this needs to be taken to task. I will await the garda investigation.”

A spokesman for the Marine Department said: “The Coast Guard found a group of 13 people stranded on one of the islands, they were picked up and brought to shore.”

It is understood the 13 workers had been dropped off at Colt Island, an uninhabited piece of land around a quarter of a mile off the coast from the town of Skerries, where they were working as periwinkle pickers.

The group were expecting a person to come and pick them back up after their work was completed. But they were later informed the boat had broken down and they would have to stay the night on the uninhabited island.

Rescuers discovered the group huddled around a camp fire and it is understood they were not equipped with protective clothing, shelter or food.

Sean Ryan, a Labour Party TD for Dublin North, said there must be a full investigation into the circumstances in which the pickers were abandoned.

“It is almost beyond belief that employees should be treated in such a way and lives of vulnerable workers put at risk. We are lucky that we are not dealing with the aftermath of a disaster on the scale experienced in Morecambe Bay in England last year when 21 Chinese cockle pickers drowned,” Mr Ryan said.

“This is just the latest example of what is now an emerging pattern of the systematic exploitation and mistreatment of foreign workers by a minority of employees.”

Mr Ryan said this was taking place at a time when the Labour Inspectorate of the Employment Department was clearly understaffed.

Mr Sargent said any exploitation of workers needs to be challenged.

The Department of the Marine are investigating whether the boat was licensed, and equipped with sufficient safety materials, to transport 13 people to the island.

Gardai in Skerries are investigating the matter and working to establish who was responsible for putting the group on the island and the circumstances under which they came to be left there.

The Irish Coast Guard said it was alerted at 9.45pm on Saturday night after a person informed them a boat had broken down off the islands at Skerries.

It is understood one of the stranded group raised the alarm through contacting a person on the shore with a mobile phone.

The group were picked up at 10pm on Saturday night by Skerries Lifeboat and taken to shore.