Question to the Department for Transport:

To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, when his Department last met with representatives of P&O Ferries to discuss seafarer employment.

The MV European Endeavour has been sold to Eckero Line and will operate on the Helsinki/Tallinn route. P&O have confirmed that another vessel, the Mistral, that operated the Liverpool-Dublin route while the MV European Endeavour was undergoing a refit will continue to operate the route after the sale of the MV European Endeavor.

P&O have made a commercial decision to replace a passenger ro-ro ferry with a ro-ro cargo vessel to meet the changing demands of the freight market and particularly a rising demand for unaccompanied freight. Seafarers are required to meet the minimum standards of training as set out in the STCW Convention and no assessment is proposed to be made on the standards of seafarers operating in the Irish Sea.

The choice of which crewing agency to employ seafarers from is a commercial decision and a matter of choice for any shipping company to make for itself. The Government does not hold data relating to which crewing agencies shipping companies use.

There have been no recent meetings with P&O where employment was discussed.