Big decision: companies associated with the ship breaking industry will now have to take full responsibility of the workers

 abstract

A recent decision by the Court of Appeal of England and Wales will have the effect that British shipping companies can be sued in London in Bangladesh as well as India and Pakistan, in case of death or injury to laborers working in this industry. ...

Detailed

There has been a major legal victory for laborers working in Bangladesh's ship breaking industry. A recent decision by the Court of Appeal of England and Wales will have the effect that British shipping companies can be sued in London in Bangladesh as well as in India and Pakistan, in case of death or injury to laborers working in this industry. . According to the newspaper The Guardian, this is the first decision of its kind in the world.

The court said in its judgment that the companies that sell their ships to South Asian countries, they are responsible for taking care of the laborers working in the ship breaking industry. The court said that this responsibility will also be in the case of third party companies, which are involved in this work.

This important decision came on the petition of Bangladesh woman Hamida Begum. Hamida Begum's husband died during the 2018 three-million-tonne oil tanker collision while collapsing. The incident occurred on the Chittagong coast of Bangladesh. Now the effect of the latest decision will be that Hamida Begum will be able to file a case against the shipping company Maran (UK) in a London court.

Bangladesh's ship breaking industry has been notorious for its laxity in regulations related to environmental protection and workers' safety. It is now expected that after the latest judicial verdict in Britain, the path of legal action will be opened in all such cases. This will force the ship breaking industry to improve its working conditions.

According to a report by The Guardian, 216 laborers have died in the shipbreaking industry located on the Chittagong coast in the last 15 years. There have been seven such deaths this year. Apart from these, many people have been disabled. Earlier reports stated that laborers in Chittagong have to work in a dangerous and dirty environment. But shipping companies change ownership by selling the vessels and thus shirk their responsibility. Significantly, the ships are made of asbestos, which causes heavy damage to the environment during breaking. At the same time, dangerous chemicals also enter the atmosphere while breaking ships, which have a very bad effect on the health of the people working there.

Even before this, two such court decisions had come, which gave the people of poor countries the right to sue multinational companies for polluting and not taking care of the interests of the laborers. According to those rulings, the British or their UK-based subsidiaries will be able to be tried in British courts.

Last month, a decision was given by the British Supreme Court. In it, he had said that Nigerian farmers and fishermen can file a lawsuit in a British court against the Royal Dutch Shell Company for the oil business involving pollution. The court rejected the argument of this company that the responsibility of pollution in Nigeria does not fall on it.

In another important judgment, the British Supreme Court said in 2019 that Zambia's rural British company can sue Vedanta in a British court. Significantly, Vedanta's subsidiary company is working in Zambia's mining sector. The court said in its judgment that the main company is responsible for the pollution caused during the business of the associate company, so it is now Vedanta's responsibility to take care of the villagers there.

According to experts, a big progress has been made towards fixing the accountability of the corporate sector with the latest decisions.

   

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