Wow! Now your crew are actually employees - or so says a lawyer!

[savageseadog]

Everyone forgets that the law is a flexible friend, especially for lawyers. It's most often the case in litigation that a case is put forward, the defendant responds, there's some negotiation and a settlement arrived at, basically blackmail as legal costs are horrific. As a solicitor she would have been well aware of how litigation works and it's probably a standard cynical try-on which will probably make her and her friends a bit of money. The RkJ company will probably settle simply to avoid the financial risk of defending an uncertain case.

I can say that I have had some female crew that have been OK on a personal basis but I have had more than one lady crew that have been truly horrific divas who seem to think the world revolves around them and what they want. I now try to stick with an all male crew.

 

[DannyB]

I thought this comment was priceless!

What a shame to see someone give up so much for a cherished dream only to find the reality so disappointing. Reminds me of Gordon Brown - so sad.

 

[JumbleDuck]

That was nothing to do with employment relationships - it was defining whether the voyage was for the benefit of the owner when the crew was making a contribution. A contribution and the crew having responsibilities on board differentiates from a "commercial" voyage and therefore the boat requires coding..

The issue then was not to do with any contribution by the crew, but about taking people sailing who were not friends of the owner, and the MCA chap's view was that it was fine if they were engaged as crew. That's very useful, and it would not be helpful if a court (not an employment tribunal, as their decisions aren't binding) decided that engagement as crew required a full employer-employee relationship.

To put it another way: a decision that the woman in this case was a passenger and not a member of crew might let Clipper off the hook but impale skippers who take non-friends as crew if they are classified as passengers too.

 

[JumbleDuck]

This woman - and Jumbleduck I fear - clearly didn't get the idea and spirit of RKJ's outfit ...

As far as I can see, her complaint is not that she was badly treated in an absolute sense but that she was worse treated than the men on board. Is that a published aspect of the Clipper spirit?

I sail with a friend who has loads of experience and more qualifications than I do. A couple of years ago she paid to join a skippered trip - not Clipper - and when she got aboard the young male skipper made it clear that, as a woman, she'd be expected to do the cooking and not bother her silly little head with the men's business of sailing the thing. She let him live, just.

Unpleasant sexist attitudes are pretty deeply entrenched and if the woman in this case encountered them I don't see why she shouldn't seek redress

 

[[70521]]

A very sad day. I wonder what her expectations of the trip were?

 

[snowleopard]

It is probable, that she signed 'ships articles', as crew on a British Flagged Merchant Vessel.

Yes. All voyage crew on Lord Nelson and Tenacious sign articles when joining. That part of the case is probably in her favour. Proving a case of bullying is much more difficult and she is unlikely to succeed unless she has at least one convincing witness to back her up.

That said, I have sailed with some pretty awful shipmates including the odd bully who could make your life pretty miserable. Imagine shelling out your life savings for a great adventure like that and finding yourself cooped up with one or more individuals who take pleasure in making your life miserable. It's also a fact that an unattractive woman can come in for a lot of ego-demolishing, worse still if she isn't very strong and/or competent and the crew are very gung-ho.

 

[jerrytug]

A very sad day. I wonder what her expectations of the trip were?

Having her clothes cruelly rent asunder then bent over the capstan and being roughly and repeatedly taken by a drunken mob of horny-handed pirates. Before breakfast, every day.
Allegedly. She was bitterly disappointed so she sues.

 

[alant]

Yes. All voyage crew on Lord Nelson and Tenacious sign articles when joining. That part of the case is probably in her favour. Proving a case of bullying is much more difficult and she is unlikely to succeed unless she has at least one convincing witness to back her up.

That said, I have sailed with some pretty awful shipmates including the odd bully who could make your life pretty miserable. Imagine shelling out your life savings for a great adventure like that and finding yourself cooped up with one or more individuals who take pleasure in making your life miserable. It's also a fact that an unattractive woman can come in for a lot of ego-demolishing, worse still if she isn't very strong and/or competent and the crew are very gung-ho.

As I mentioned previously, these 'crew', go through a long & rigorous training/selection process, before being allowed on any of the trip legs. This involves long offshore trips (obviously not as long as the actual), with eventually the same group of people she would be crewing with. Some, suitably qualified 'customer crew', will act as skippers/watchkeepers, with the pro skipper onboard as 'back-up'. These ocean legs, are extremely arduous/stressful, but why she didn't bleat earlier, I find odd.

I get a feeling, that she might have 'pushed peas' up the noses of the rest of her crew (not turning out on watch/duties) & their attitude upset her. The 'skipper' should have been aware of this & dealt with it before it got out of hand.

 

[cliff]

Lucky she didn't fall overboard during the night!

Mid Atlantic with a leaky life jacket?

 

[Lakesailor]

I was a worker for the provisions of the Employment Rights Act, as regards safety, and I was covered by Equality Act provisions 'in any capacity' on board, as regards harassment. Complex legal argument here involves both domestic and EU law, and similar recent cases have gone as far as the Supreme Court."

So in true lawyerly fashion she is pulling together strands of laws which she will attempt to stitch together to cover her (insert your own adjective) arse. She has obviously taken more than a huff at her "treatment" and intends to "do something about it".
How long have these sorts of voyages been happening? How many cases of legal redress have been sought before? Her treatment is either unique or she has been attending too many employment rights seminars.
To try to shift the intention of the organisers to suit her own ends is mean and damaging if it tilts the table and ends up with people being unwilling to undertake the operation of these adventures.

 

[alant]

So in true lawyerly fashion she is pulling together strands of laws which she will attempt to stitch together to cover her (insert your own adjective) arse. She has obviously taken more than a huff at her "treatment" and intends to "do something about it".
How long have these sorts of voyages been happening? How many cases of legal redress have been sought before? Her treatment is either unique or she has been attending too many employment rights seminars.
To try to shift the intention of the organisers to suit her own ends is mean and damaging if it tilts the table and ends up with people being unwilling to undertake the operation of these adventures.

I've met & trained many of the Clipper crews.
They are from all corners of the world (China/NZ/Oz/US/etc) & most have a desire to do something memorable with their lives, before the lid shuts, giving up savings/family/time, to achieve this. Many, are 'achievers' in the day job/lives & can find it difficult to knuckle down to 'taking orders'. Failure to bond as a crew, can be & is something of a safety issue. If you cannot contribute fully, you put the rest at risk. Maybe she found this intolerable.

Sailing across an ocean, on a 'small' boat, keeping a disciplined watch system, with a small crew of 'strangers', can be stressful. Its as much a psychological test as it is physical & many can't handle it.

 

[Sandgrounder]

So in true lawyerly fashion she is pulling together strands of laws which she will attempt to stitch together to cover her (insert your own adjective) arse. She has obviously taken more than a huff at her "treatment" and intends to "do something about it".
How long have these sorts of voyages been happening? How many cases of legal redress have been sought before? Her treatment is either unique or she has been attending too many employment rights seminars.
To try to shift the intention of the organisers to suit her own ends is mean and damaging if it tilts the table and ends up with people being unwilling to undertake the operation of these adventures.

Interestingly she was a partner at Hunton & Wiliams a practice active on both sides of the Atlantic and specialising in representing and advising employers not disgruntled employees.

As for her "stringing a few threads............". The essential skill of a lawyer in contentious work is not just to follow the well trodden path but to look at law and regulation and to consider what it might mean not merely to accept the blindingly obvious - clearly this involves pushing the boundaries which, of course, is intolerable except when they are doing it on your behalf.

As I said previously she may have a case; she may not. Until the evidence is presented we cannot know, unless someone has inside info, so all the speculation about who did what to whom is just that; speculation and not worth the cyberspace it is written on.

 

[dom]

If you cannot contribute fully, you put the rest at risk. Maybe she found this intolerable.

Maybe she couldn't hack it, maybe she could; maybe she couldn't take orders, maybe someone gave her orders simply to humiliate her; maybe the skipper was anti-women, maybe he/she was a weak character unable to restrain a witch hunt by strong minded "achievers"; maybe lots of things.

But her first port of call has nothing to do with such speculation; she wants to establish if she can bring a case under employment law, presumably to take advantage of the open ended damages available if sexual discrimination can be proved.

It will be quite a big deal for many of us if she succeeds.

 

[Lakesailor]

Yes. Whatever the facts or the outcome, it seems mean-spirited as the case seems to be about her, not about the clarifying the situation of candidates for the adventure.
If that were the case why did she not seek to establish the position before undertaking the voyage?
Something has discoloured her view of the voyage and she now seeks to persuade a judge the situation falls within an area of the law in which she feels she can extract retribution in the form of damages.

The fact that the practice also operates in America comes as no surprise at all.

If lawyers carry on with this "perfectly legitimate" re-drawing of the intention of the law, we will soon have no opportunities to step outside our front doors.

 

[ralphmalph]

Here is her charity page she was raising money for Cornwall Air Ambluance.

https://www.justgiving.com/ruthclipper2013/

She praises the "fabulous team" and she is "lucky to be skippered by the amazing Pete Sterling."

Something has obviously gone very sour.

 

[dom]

If lawyers carry on with this "perfectly legitimate" re-drawing of the intention of the law...

Good point; removing the cap on damages in cases such as disability, sexual, or racial discrimination has inadvertently created a pot of gold, not at the foot of the rainbow, but within the confined of employment law, into which lawyers are consequently trying to squeeze all sorts of cases.

I have no view or knowledge about the merits of this woman's case. But I very much hope the courts resist her attempt to widen the scope employment law in this manner. The argument, however, will not rest solely on the basis that she paid for the trip; interns fall in a similarly grey area, yet almost all are afforded the protection of UK employment law.

 

[jonjo]

What next swmbo's demanding the minimum wage while afloat and a published grievance procedure?

 

[alant]

Maybe she couldn't hack it, maybe she could; maybe she couldn't take orders, maybe someone gave her orders simply to humiliate her; maybe the skipper was anti-women, maybe he/she was a weak character unable to restrain a witch hunt by strong minded "achievers"; maybe lots of things.

But her first port of call has nothing to do with such speculation; she wants to establish if she can bring a case under employment law, presumably to take advantage of the open ended damages available if sexual discrimination can be proved.

It will be quite a big deal for many of us if she succeeds.

Hardly, people like that get weeded out very quickly.
Her skipper + all the others, would have been with her in training, which for these guys is over 2 years prior to sailing an ocean, so any moans/problem would have been noticed before the main trip, particularly by her as an individual.

 

[Nico]

I don't really mix it with racing crews but I remember very clearly hitting the Needles Channel heading east in a bit of a blow and being overhauled by a racing boat (flyer if memory serves) who were quite literally screaming at each other in order to get even better performance from their beast. They left me feeling slightly inadequate in terms of boat speed comparisons! I think RKJ's fleet are classed as a racing fleet and if this lawyer wasn't up for being verbally and occasionally physically abused, then she shouldn't have signed up in the first place. Racing is a world apart from cruising.

I've sailed in racing crews for over twenty years and one thing I've discovered in that time is that the nearer you get to the front of the fleet the quieter it gets. Shouting is very old school, and usually counter-productive.

 

[dom]

Hardly, people like that get weeded out very quickly.
Her skipper + all the others, would have been with her in training, which for these guys is over 2 years prior to sailing an ocean, so any moans/problem would have been noticed before the main trip, particularly by her as an individual.

Very sensible, but a defence heavily dependent on internal procedures would collapse in a heap if just a single instance of procedural failure could be proved.

The facts of this case remain hearsay for now and will be something for a court to decide upon, but only AFTER another court rules whether the case can be brought under employment law. The danger for recreational sailors is that this case may set a dangerous precedent that crew can under certain circumstances be treated as employees. I doubt this will happen, but if it does we can all expect our insurance premiums to substantially rise.