Observation (CEACR) - adopted 2005, published 95th ILC session (2006)

The Committee notes the information provided by the Government that the Overseas Programme Act No. 2003-660 of 21 July 2003 provides in section 62 that, under the conditions set out in article 38 of the Constitution, the Government is authorized to take, by ordinance, the necessary measures, in so far as they lie within the competence of the State, for the updating and adaptation of the law applicable in the French Southern and Antarctic Territories (TAAF) to seafarers, ports, vessels and other seagoing ships, as well as in relation to the law respecting labour, employment and vocational training, which will therefore make it possible to undertake the necessary updating and, in particular, to specify in so far as necessary the means of application of Convention No. 8. It also notes the Government’s statement that the situation of seafarers engaged on vessels registered in the TAAF was dependent on the adoption of the Bill establishing the French International Register and that this Bill did in practice result in the adoption of Act No. 2005-412 of 3 May 2005, section 13(1) of which provides that “the conditions of recruitment, employment, labour and life on board a vessel registered on the French International Register may not be less favourable than those resulting from the international labour Conventions ratified by France”.

The Government adds that the highest administrator of the French Southern and Antarctic Territories, by Order No. 10 dated 2 April 1992, declared the Unemployment Indemnity (Shipwreck) Convention, 1920 (No. 8), applicable. Although not self-executing, the provisions of the Convention are very succinct and precise, with the result that the Head of the Maritime Affairs Services of the TAAF, who is responsible for maritime labour inspection for the vessels concerned, can intervene at any time in relation to the vessels in question with a view to enforcing these provisions based, where necessary, on the above Order. No such case has however occurred up to now.

The Committee notes this information. It recalls in this respect the Government’s statement in its previous report that the provisions of the Convention could usefully be considered in the form of an explicit reference in the context of a proposed amendment of the Overseas Labour Code, based on the provisions of the Act of 15 February 1929, adopted for Metropolitan France, which establishes an unemployment indemnity for seafarers in the event of the seizure, shipwreck or the declaration of the unseaworthiness of a vessel. Considering that it would indeed be desirable for measures to be adopted in laws or regulations to secure the full implementation of the provisions of the Convention in the French Southern and Antarctic Territories, as has been done for Metropolitan France, the Committee hopes that the Government will take the opportunity afforded by the Overseas Programme Act No. 2003-660 of 21 July 2003 and Act No. 2005-412 of 3 May 2005 establishing the International Register to adopt such measures in the very near future. It requests the Government to provide information on any progress achieved in this respect.