Amendment of the directives on exclusions for seafarers

 welcomes the Commission's initiative to review the current exclusion rules relating to application of certain labour law directives to seafarers, and broadly endorses the current proposal for a directive;

 stresses how important it is for protection rules relating to Article 151 TFEU to apply as far as possible in the same way to all categories of workers in the Member States, and for there to be a level playing-field for the maritime sector within the EU regardless of which Member State operations take place in;

 believes the requirement to ensure equal treatment of employees must carry particular weight where there is a question of rights that are recognised in the European Union Charter of Fundamental Rights. As the Commission notes, this includes the right to information and consultation and the right to fair and just working conditions;

 considers that reservations based on the risks of putting EU businesses at a competitive disadvantage – even if Member States that also apply the protection requirements of the directives to seafarers have not reported any obviously negative consequences for competitiveness – should be taken seriously . Individual Member States are best placed to assess the impact of mandatory implementation of a given rule according to the practices and traditions applicable to the country's shipping industry;

 considers that it should still be left to each Member State to decide, on the basis of local conditions, whether protection rules should apply to seafarers alongside the right to information and consultation in cases of transfer of an undertaking and collective redundancies, and to what extent these rules should apply.