the West Coast are you pay the wages. You didn't pay any penalty wages, and bringing these cases is phenomenally expensive.

There are very few lawyers that handle cases of this nature simply because of the cost of bringing them. Last week I had two ships under arrest in New Orleans. One was the MV Star King. We let it go yesterday because they agreed to pay the $270,000 in back wages to the Russian crew, and before that we had the Alexandria Unity, which was a little over $500,000.

That Bulgarian crew hadn't been paid for six months. We have mandatory jurisdiction for wages, but not for the abuses, not for the blacklistings, not for the beatings. I have got the case of Pedro Antonio. He was serving on a Japanese-owned ship. He asked for his wages, and they beat him, gave him brain damage. We are going to try that in State court in Texas, because Texas, like Louisiana in State court, we thankfully do not have the doctrine of forum non conveniens. We may get applied foreign law, but our court will at least hear it. Whereas if you go to Federal Court they are going to send you back to the Philippines or send you back to Poland or India, send you someplace where you will get no money. Those are the abuses. I can name you ships, times, dates and places if you want and be pleased to do so. If you like, I will address the questions that you had. You had numerous questions that I picked up when I came in on how can you guarantee compliance. It is very simple. If they don't comply, they don't do business here, and we are the largest trading country in the world, and they will do business in the United States, period. ILO

Mr. HUBBARD. If you would, Mr. Dodson, and I appreciate your testimony, I, too, am an attorney, and I appreciate your profession. The only problem is we have a 1:30 meeting

Mr. DODSON. I am sorry, I will desist. Thank you so much.

[The prepared statement of Mr. Dodson can be found at the end of the hearing.]

Mr. HUBBARD. I do have some more questions when the panel is finished, but we do have a 1:30 meeting in here for a reorganization of our full Merchant Marine and Fisheries Committee presided over by Congressman Gerry Studds. We need to have that type of meeting because of the death of our beloved Chairman, Walter Jones.

Let me I am concerned about the roll call votes. The next one is going to be recommittal and final passage, and that is going to take, unfortunately, about 20 minutes absence by the Chair.

I believe our last witness to testify among the gentlemen seated here for Panel Three is Mark Zalenski, the Director of Public Affairs, District 1, Pacific Coast District, MEBA, Baltimore. We are glad to have you.

STATEMENT OF MARK A. ZALENSKI

Mr. ZALENSKI. Good afternoon, Mr. Chairman. I perhaps exercised some forethought and my remarks are brief. My name is Mark Zalenski. I am entering these remarks on behalf of Gordon Ward, the President of the 117-year-old National Marine Engineers' Beneficial Association and of the reborn District Number 1-Pacific Coast District of MEBA.

The MEBA represents the majority of U.S. flag maritime officers and stands in support of H.R. 1126. I am joined today by Alexander Shandrowsky, our Atlantic Coast Vice President and by several of our rank and file members who have come over from Baltimore also.

Undeniably, life at sea is hard. Aboard ship, 5,000 or 10,000 lonely miles from home, any seaman keenly feels the value of working for a company that provides minimum decent working conditions—a clean bunk, a weathertight cabin, fresh water. Out there, it is no exaggeration to say that the captain and the company have near total control over person's life.

Foreign seamen laboring aboard flag-of-convenience vessels often become, de facto, stateless persons. Lacking even the most basic protections and any substantive means of redress for their grievances, too often they are either persecuted or simply ignored by their companies, even when their demands are as essential as edible food or a reliable source of freshwater.

Anywhere, some of the instances of abuse that have been documented (as Mr. Dodson spoke of, and documented by seamen's welfare organizations and other groups), anywhere these would be unsettling, but that such conditions occur on vessels which regularly call on United States ports is unconscionable, particularly when such vessels are U.S.-owned or operated.

I am a merchant seaman. I came ashore about a year ago to do this job. Previous to that I have, in my travels, spoken with the chaplains of seamen's churches all over the world and have heard similar stories relayed to me as those that Mr. Dodson is willing to volunteer to you (by sending along the book "Trouble on Board"). They are not pleasant. I can assure you from my personal experience aboard U.S.-flag ships that the conditions under which American seamen work and live are far better than those that would result from the most rigorous enforcement of the provisions of H.R. 1126.

So I must disagree mildly with some of our other friends in labor and others here. I don't think this is a level playing field bill, but rather one that seeks to extend certain minimum protections of U.S. labor law to foreign seamen while they are in our waters. We are not talking about something that requires a new and complex monitoring system, I really don't think, but about very simple provisions that would allow foreign seamen to freely associate to demand the bare necessities that make life on board tolerable-not comfortable by American seagoing standards, but tolerable.

We talk a lot these days about environmental concerns and protections in the maritime industry, and in the marine environment. But is it possible to attempt to legislate protections for our oceans and waterways when we have not yet dealt satisfactorily with the working conditions of those who work on these runaway-flag_vessels? If a company says it cannot afford edible food, what about waste processing equipment, oily water separators and pollution monitoring equipment aboard the vessel?

Will companies that cannot or will not buy blankets for men at sea in stormy weather be responsible about our waterways? I don't think so.

The costs imposed by this proposed legislation are slight. If a company is that marginal, maybe somebody else should be carrying the cargo. Basic labor rights are necessities for all who work on our waters, regardless of the flag flying off the stern.

From testimony given by others on this issue in the past and today, it does not appear that a universal sense of foreign-flag responsibility for the conditions discussed will develop unless it is so legislated.

In closing, I urge you to extend these minimum protections of Federal labor law as specified in H.R. 1126 to foreign seamen working in our waters. Not for economic reasons, Mr. Chairman, but because it is unthinkable to allow the abuse of these essential rights of foreign nationals by companies trading in the United States. Thank you.

Mr. HUBBARD. Thank you. We are now under a time gun again; I will go back to vote and then come back one more time to ask the questions, but let me try a few questions here hurriedly.

If the National Labor Relations Act and the Fair Labor Standards Act are applied to foreign-flag vessels calling on American ports, how can compliance be guaranteed after the vessels leave port and, particularly, after they are out in international waters? Would one of you lead off in answering that?

Mr. SCHNEIDER. The biggest single issue, and it is much the same way securities laws apply, to the extent they are going to come back into U.S. waters, then the jurisdiction is automatic, and it is very easy to monitor. To the extent, and the analogy with the airlines is appropriate here to the extent that an American airline flies overseas, the crew is still covered by the National Labor Relations Act. If the vessel never comes back into U.S. waters, in real terms it is going to be all but impossible to enforce, so in real terms that is why we argue that the regularly engaged in American trade is an important part of the language.

Mr. HUBBARD. Anyone else want to add to the answer there, Tal Simpkins?

Mr. SIMPKINS. Carnival Lines, for example, has its base operations in Florida. They certainly are not a foreign company-where would they go? They have no place to go. This is their base of operation. There may be a ship where a violation occurs and then disappears. True we could not enforce the law in that case, but we are not talking about those. We are talking about the one, as Mr. Schneider says, the ones that are here, the ones that return, the ones that are here almost on a daily basis.

Mr. HUBBARD. You are not talking about foreign-flag vessels? Mr. SIMPKINS. Yes, we are. We are talking about the Carnival Lines which is foreign-flag, Panama, Liberia, Marshall Islands, Vanuatu, all those. Only the ones who do business here.

Mr. HUBBARD. Anyone else want to answer or add to the answer there?

There has been some indication that there are difficulties regarding enforcement of ILO 147 as it applies to crewmen. Could you elaborate on this problem?

Mr. DODSON. Well, as I mentioned in my testimony there is no enforcement of it as to labor conditions or things like that. The Department of Labor has never implemented it, and the complaint by

the crewmember gets him fired, sent home, blacklisted, and all of that. It doesn't take long for that word to get around.

Mr. HUBBARD. In terms of standards for crew welfare among the major industrialized nations, I believe Mr. Dodson has already pointed out some of the cruel and inhuman treatment provided some of these crewmen back in their home countries when they ask questions about wages and safety conditions. How do they stack up to the standards for U.S. crewmen? That answer is sort of obvious, but do you want to

Mr. DODSON. Well, a true flag is fine, whether it is a British flag or a French flag or whatever. They have comparable standards, but where you have a problem are with Liberia and Panama and Cyprus and Vanuatu and the other numerous countries that don't have any standards and don't enforce their standards. It is a commercial enterprise, so the true national flags, like the American flag, I don't see any real problems with those.

Mr. SIMPKINS. The ITF minimums, the thousand dollars a month, it is comparable to the U.S. minimum wage. There would be no problem at all. For these companies that really pay their seamen ITF wages, for example, there is no problem. The wage rates would not go up. For the guys that treat the seamen decently there is no problem here. We are only after the ones that do not, and the oceans are full of them.

Mr. HUBBARD. Tal Simpkins said that. We have heard Burma, the Philippines, and some others, but besides Burma and the Philippines, what countries are the most notorious for the mistreatment of crewmen on their flag vessels.

Mr. DODSON. Well, they are not their flag vessels. These are citizens of Philippines and Burma and many third world developing countries serve on flag-of-convenience levels; that is, Liberian, Panamanian and etcetera. I have never seen a Burmese-flag vessel. I am sure there are some. Maldivian Islands, islands off the coast of India, they are terrible. I have had reports of seamen being beat when they go back. They have to give the money back and all that. Sri Lanka, Sri Lankan seamen, they are frequently afraid to complain. The Burmese, they are horribly abused, and then the Filipinos, it depends a lot on the manning agent.

Basically the government is just completely ineffective. They don't do anything, because their main job is to export human labor and earn that hard currency. The Philippine law requires 80 percent of the wages to be sent home to the central bank in dollars, and that is a major source of their earnings, so they care about the seamen. They don't care about the money.

Mr. HUBBARD. You have heard the testimony of the two gentlemen, Mr. Loree and Mr. Estes. Do any of you gentlemen on Panel Three have any specific examples of mistreatment of crewmen on foreign-flag vessels owned by companies represented by either the Federation of American Controlled Shipping or the International Council of Cruise Lines?

Mr. DODSON. I have numerous. In fact, I have more examples than we have time here. I would call the Chairman's attention to the book by Paul Chapman, "Trouble on Board: The Plight of International Seafarers," published in 1992 by Cornell Press. It is full of numerous examples as is the testimony given before the

Committee on Education and Labor. Dale Wamstad gave some examples on Armand Hammer and others.

Mr. HUBBARD. We are going to resume with Mr. Dodson as soon as I come back. Unfortunately, it is going to be about 15 minutes, I am sorry. There are two votes here. We are in recess.

[RECESS]

Mr. HUBBARD. The Subcommittee will now reconvene. My apologies for the delay. It was a lengthy wait for Members to appear on the first roll call. There was an argument over whether or not the second roll call was placed in time by one of our colleagues from North Carolina. There was a lengthy argument about whether he had made a timely request for a recorded vote. So we are at 1:13. I appreciate your patience in staying with us.

I had asked the last question I had in mind. Do any of you on Panel Three wish to add to the record? Your full statements are already in the record, and your comments additionally.

Mr. DODSON. Just one thing. Mr. Loree reminded me that when I was talking about some of the abuses on the cruise vessels that are mentioned in this book that they were not members of his organization, the Federation of American Controlled Shipping, and the other two examples I gave of Reverend Wamstad's testimony of an American-owned vessel bulk carrier and another one, he says those were also not members of his organization. They were Americanowned but not members of his group, and I certainly don't want to-and he knows best, because I don't know who belongs to his group.

Mr. HUBBARD. So then do you have any specific examples of mistreatment of crewmen on foreign-flagged vessels owned by companies represented by either of the groups represented by

Mr. DODSON. No, I do have examples.

Mr. HUBBARD. By Mr. Estes or Mr. Loree?

Mr. DODSON. Yes, from the cruise industry they are repeated in the "Trouble On Board," and I will be happy to-I would like the pleasure of sending a copy to each Member of the Committee.

As far as American-owned ships, but not members of Mr. Loree's organization, I do have examples of those.

Mr. SIMPKINS. Mr. Chairman, again we don't know who his members are. Courts can't even find out who his members are. If he gives us a list, we would love to check it out.

Mr. HUBBARD. I am counting on his eagerly sending you a list today or tomorrow. I am, for the record, kidding.

Mr. Dodson, I regret that I cut you off at one point. I was fearful of the time slipping away from us. Do you have anything else you want to add, you or Mr. Zalenski?

Mr. ZALENSKI. No, I would only like to add that one of the important things here, and I tried to say that in my statement, is that this wasn't a level playing field bill, that really the right to freely associate and some enforcement of that right is what is very important. Of course, I am coming from a labor union position, but I think a lot of these problems could be solved just by granting the crew the right to freely associate and decide when they had a problem what a solution could be.