Official defeat of Seafarers’ right to decent working time

In 2009 the European Working Time Directive limits the weekly working hours to an average of 48 in all European Union member states. The recent published effects on education and patient care are discussed. In European Union member states with traditional long working hours for hospital doctors the reduced working hours led to a decrease in trainee case loads. A negative effect on patients care is only suspected, but not yet measured. In particular, British anesthetists started a discussion about the required changes in training and assessment to counterbalance the lack of practice. European Surgical Disciplines demand for 48 h working time and 12 h teaching and education time per week for trainees. So far many member states have delayed the implementation of European laws in national laws. There are less measured clinical facts than political statements published. The actual working time directives in the European Union member states are inconsistent and further political development on this topic across the European Union remains unclear.

The topic of the research as a whole is dedicated to studies of the work load of navigation officers and, consequently, is related to the current international research on the quality of working life. Issues of seafarers' working time are very topical because in recent years the load of navigation officers has significantly increased, either due to increase in shipping intensity, or in the context of the new international maritime law, for example, compliance with the requirements of the ISM CODE (International Management safety Code), THE ISPS (The International Ship and Port Facility Security Code). Irregularities are observed in practice of the seafarers' working hours and rest hours, and even the mismatch, as presented in the port of inspection materials. This article is intended to assess the 2nd and 3rd Officer's load compliance with the regulatory enactments for the work and rest regime to develop proposals to load optimization. Load analysis of Navigation officers is based on international maritime regulations that determine the work and rest regime on ships STCW (The International Convention on Standards of Training, Certification and Watchkeeping for Seafarers), MLC (Maritime Labour Convention). In the article, concrete data is used from the research, which was conducted 18 months on the Handy type of tanker from July, 2012 till December, 2013 in the real time mode. In the article is also concrete data used from 340 survey respondents, which reflects the views of the navigation officers on violations of the work and rest regime on the ship and the fatigue issue.

Lithuania's labour limits

Onboard Training (OBT) has been recognized as one of the most effective means of practical training for seafarers as part of Maritime Education and Training. The International Convention on Standards of Training, Certification and Watchkeeping for Seafarers 1978, as amended prescribes 12 months as the minimum mandatory seagoing service for candidates for officers in charge of a navigational watch. Within this period, cadets are required to complete their OBT requirements which may include Training Record Book tasks, project work, among others. In terms of cadets’ work and rest hours onboard the ship, the Maritime Labour Convention, 2006 (MLC, 2006) stands as a pivotal governing international instrument including the working and living conditions of seafarers, in general. This study aimed to determine the relationship between the amount of work and rest hours to the productivity of deck cadets in a structured OBT program onboard a training ship. Through quantitative research, the researchers gathered the records of work/rest hours of 53 deck cadets during their training program and analyzed their OBT documents to determine their progress. Results showed that the cadets were able to accomplish their OBT requirements within the allowable work hours as stipulated in MLC, 2006. Further, the researchers concluded that there is no relationship between the number of rest hours and their productivity, which was attributed to the merits of a structured OBT program. This study recommends to look for opportunities to improve the structured OBT program onboard training ships, and furthermore, investigate the same onboard commercial vessels setting.

Data protection and research in the European Union: a major step forward, with a step back

Ship first: Seafarers’ adjustment of records on work and rest hours

Hours of work means the actual working time excluding rest hours and summing up, regardless of a change of work place. There are no legal provisions about how working time should in fact be calculated; so does it start when the employees enter the gate and continue until they leave, or does it start only when they make themselves ready to begin work and end when they finish working? The Labour Standards Law only stipulates that for underground work the hours of work include the whole period from pit-head to pit-head, including recesses. Thus, for ordinary work this will be a matter to be decided by agreement or in the work rules. In the absence of any stipulation or established practice, the Courts have laid down that it should be calculated from gate to gate. However, even if, for example, it is laid down in the work rules that working time starts from the time when the employees get ready to begin work and ends when they actually finish work, the question is still likely to arise as to whether the time needed to get ready for work and to finish work — changing clothes, washing and so on — should be included in the working time or not. As for those employees who work outside the premises and take their work home without coming back, and those who are on business trips, it is presumed that they are keeping normal working hours unless they are ordered to do otherwise or have proof of having worked extra hours.

Developed by a joint working group of the International Labour Organization (ILO) and IMO, these guidelines are designed to help Administrations, shipowners and seafarers meet their obligations under ILO Convention No. 180 (Seafarers’ Hours of Work and the Manning of Ships Convention) and IMO’s STCW Convention, 1978, as amended in 1995. They provide a standardized table showing shipboard working arrangements, a standard format for records of seafarer’s daily hours of work and rest and guidelines for monitoring compliance.

Lithuania's labour limits

The perspective and role of the medical oncologist in cancer prevention: A position paper by the European Society for Medical Oncology

Worktime control : theoretical conceptualization, current empirical knowledge, and research agenda

Since day one, retailers and consumers have favoured plastic carrier bags. However, owing to the numerous environmental disadvantages, lightweight plastic carrier bags have been drawing the attention of the European Union competent authorities. Therefore, many European Union member states have taken action so as to reduce the use of plastic carrier bags. Based on the existing legislation and voluntary initiatives for the reduction of lightweight plastic carrier bags, the challenges and achieved outcomes from the implemented policy options in the various European Union member states are discussed and commented regarding the forthcoming transposition of the 'Directive 94/62/EC on packaging and packaging waste to reduce the consumption of lightweight plastic carrier bags' into the European Union member states' national law.

The purpose of this chapter is to analyze a particular aspect of the so-called Dublin Regulation, whose aim is to determine the European Union (EU) Member State responsible for examining an asylum application, that is, the presumption that the EU Member States are “safe countries.” Although the notion of “safe country” is on the base of the Dublin Regulation functioning mechanism, as it implies that any EU Member States can transfer an asylum seeker to any other EU country which is responsible, the authors contend that the safety of an EU Member State can be given as presumed for the purpose of asylum seekers. The analysis of the present work starts, firstly, with the examination of the notion of “safe country” under the Dublin Regulation. In the second part, relying on the European Court of Human Rights’ (ECHR) case-law, it will be discussed to what extent the Court of Strasbourg clarifies the notion of “safe countries” and the test it applies to it. Finally, the Commission’s proposal for a recasting of the Dublin Regulation will be analysed with the aim of foresee possible future developments of the EU law mechanisms to rebut such a presumption as applied to the EU Member States. It will emerge that in order to assess the safety of an EU Member State, attention has to be given to the prohibition of both direct and indirect refoulement as well as to the effective remedy at the EU Member State’s domestic level.

Disharmonization in the Regulation of Transgenic Plants in Europe

Resident work hours have been a recurring source of concern and controversy for many years. From the Spartan origins of the Halsted generic model of the surgical service at Johns Hopkins in 1897 to the present, there have been major tensions between the educational needs of learners and the workload demands of patient care, resulting, at times, in classic labor-management confrontations about work hours and conditions.