the legal doubts, determine the mode of operation, recommend measures in the area of media policy (it is worth drawing from the experience of the Crisis Team at Euroafrica Services, Branch in Poland, gained during a successful operation of rescuing the Polish seamen abducted from „Szafir”).
CONCLUSIONS AND PROPOSED MEASURES OF THE „SOLIDARITY” TRADE UNION AT THE POLISH STEAMSHIP COMPANY IN SZCZECIN 1. The most important demand of a several thousand seamen who are members of the „Solidarity” Trade Union at Polsteam is the fastest possible introduction of an amendment of the Act on Employment on Board Polish Merchant Vessels, in the form accepted by shipowners and the social side representing employees. 2. The main change regarding the form of the amended Act is the adoption of new legal regulations concerning income tax settlement and the payment of social security and disability pension contributions of seamen serving on board ships registered under the white and red flag. 3. In case of income tax, the shipowners and the social side adopted provisions introducing the zero rate. In the case of social security and disability pension contributions, the obligation has been divided between three parties: the state budget, employers and employees. 4. During the term of office of the former PO-PSL coalition government, the ministries of finance and labour rejected the solution and dismissed it as “a dangerous precedent favouring one profession at the expense of others” The government did not back down on their position despite the presented arguments and research results which had clearly shown that the proposed method of settlement of tax and social insurance and disability pension contributions has been applied in other EU countries for years, allowing shipowners to raise their national flags, according to EU maritime policy. 5. According to the „Solidarity” Trade Union at Polsteam, the return of the white and red flag flying on Polish ships should be a priority of the current PiS government. Ships of Polish shipowners are currently present on all the seas and oceans of the world. This fact should be made clear thanks to raising a Polish flag. The white and red flag on board a vessel would be one of the most effective and efficient ways to promote Poland and the Polish economy. 6. The question of Polish ships flying a white and red flag is not only related to national pride and the pride of seamen, it also has an economic aspect. Domestic shipowners, by raising flags of other countries on their vessels, are deprived of the possibility to apply for EU funding, which could be used for the improvement of technical standards and modernisation according to the Conventions’ requirements. The measures are currently implemented at the shipowners’ own expense. 7. In turn, seamen serving on Polish vessels under a foreign flag, as citizens of the Republic of Poland, are deprived of one of their most fundamental rights – the voting right, because it is impossible to form a voting district on a ship which in legal terms is a territory of another state, although the vessel formally belongs to a Polish shipowner. 8. The „Solidarity” Trade Union at Polsteam recalled that the expeditures incurred by the state, arising from the introduction of the amended Act on Employment on Board Polish Merchant Vessels, in the form proposed by employers and the social side, would be compensated by way of tonnage tax paid by shipowners to the State Treasury following the return of Polish ships under the white and red flag. We would like to remind that the Act on Tonnage Tax was signed by an ardent advocate of returning the Polish flag to Polish ships, the late President Lech Kaczyński in September 2006 in Polsteam’s head office. 9. The works on the amended Act returning the white and red flag would consideraby advance due to the reactivation of the operations of the Tripartite Team for Navigation and Maritime Fisheries, which was another demand of ship crews represented by the „Solidarity” Trade Union at Polsteam.