Equal pay for same work for ship workers on foreign ships sailing in Norwegian waters and on the Norwegian shelf?

Why?

The purpose of the legislation is to promote a fair and decent working life by ensuring that foreign seafarers receive wage conditions equivalent to those of seafarers on NOR-registered ships.

Minister of Fisheries and Oceans, Marianne Sivertsen Næss, stated: “With this, we ensure that offshore work will be conducted under Norwegian conditions, with fair pay and equal competition.”

A main argument behind the legislation is that Norwegian seafarers should not be outcompeted in their home market by seafarers earning significantly lower wages. The rules are therefore intended to contribute to a fair competitive environment in domestic shipping and offshore operations on the Norwegian continental shelf.

What do Norwegian wage conditions include?

“Wage conditions” refer to provisions concerning pay, overtime compensation, shift and rotation allowances, and inconvenience allowances. According to the ministry, wage differences are the key employment condition distinguishing employees on Norwegian and foreign ships. Therefore, other employment conditions—such as Norwegian rules on working and rest hours—are not extended to seafarers on foreign vessels.

Who will be covered?

Firstly, it has been decided that ships engaged in domestic shipping in Norway will be subject to the General Application Act (allmenngjøringsloven), meaning that the parts of a generally applicable collective agreement regulating wage conditions will apply to seafarers on foreign vessels.

The requirement for wages according to generally applicable collective agreements will apply to the following categories of shipping:

• Coastal shipping: Vessels carrying cargo or passengers between Norwegian mainland ports, but not vessels solely unloading cargo or passengers from foreign ports or solely loading cargo or passengers bound for foreign ports.
• Cruise: Cruise ships sailing between Norwegian mainland ports, including cruise ships operating exclusively from a single Norwegian port, but not vessels calling at Norwegian ports as part of voyages from or to a foreign port.
• Vessels providing other services in Norwegian waters: Vessels delivering services within Norwegian territorial waters along the mainland, with the exception of fishing and hunting vessels, vessels belonging to the Armed Forces or used in military service, or other state-owned vessels not engaged in commercial activities.

Secondly, so-called rights holders are required to ensure that employees on board vessels providing services to their operations receive Norwegian wage conditions. The requirement applies to vessels providing services to offshore industries such as petroleum, aquaculture, offshore wind, seabed minerals, and carbon capture. However, it does not apply to vessels transporting petroleum in bulk.

In this context, Norwegian wage conditions mean that seafarers on foreign vessels must not have worse wage conditions than those stipulated in the applicable nationwide collective agreements. Seafarers on foreign vessels must therefore have wage conditions in line with the agreements applicable to NOR-registered offshore vessels.

Who is responsible?

Primarily, the employer is responsible for ensuring that seafarers in domestic shipping are provided with Norwegian wage conditions in accordance with the General Application Act. If the employer is not the shipowner, the shipowner also has a duty to ensure that the rules are followed. This duty of supervision entails establishing routines to monitor and, if necessary, ensure compliance with the legal requirements. In practice, this duty can be fulfilled through requirements stipulated in contracts with rights holders or operators’ suppliers. Both the employer and the shipowner will be jointly liable for ensuring that employees receive pay in line with the applicable general application rules.

The Norwegian Maritime Authority (Sjøfartsdirektoratet) will monitor compliance with wage conditions resulting from decisions on general application for employees on ships. The authority will have standard tools at its disposal, such as inspections, administrative decisions, and sanctions. If violations are uncovered, the Maritime Authority may impose coercive fines, detentions, or administrative fines. Amendments to the Ship Safety Act have also been adopted, meaning that both the shipowner and the employer can be fined for failure to pay wages in accordance with general application decisions.

The rights holder is responsible for ensuring that employees on board vessels providing services to its operations have Norwegian wage conditions. A rights holder is defined as someone who has been granted a permit to carry out specific commercial activities outside the Norwegian coast, as further detailed in the relevant legislation.

The duty to ensure Norwegian wage conditions applies to employees on board both the rights holder’s own vessels and those of suppliers and subcontractors. The requirement for Norwegian wages covers all categories of employees working on board, such as maritime crew and industrial personnel.

The ministry will set out in a supplementary regulation how the requirement for rights holders can be met. A draft regulation is expected to be circulated for consultation during autumn 2025.

The regulation will also stipulate that sectoral authorities must monitor compliance by rights holders. The Norwegian Maritime Authority will not be a sectoral authority in this context and will not have supervisory responsibility, but cooperation between the sectoral authorities and the Maritime Authority is expected.

The legislative amendments may conflict with EEA law

As noted above, the legislative amendments are highly controversial under EEA law. The EFTA Surveillance Authority (ESA), which was consulted on a draft law with substantially the same content as the adopted legislation, concluded that the draft was in breach of EEA law.

In short, ESA found that the draft law violated EU/EEA regulations on the freedom to provide maritime transport services, namely Regulation 3577/92 on the freedom to provide cabotage services, as well as Regulation 4055/86 on the freedom to provide international maritime transport services. ESA considered the draft to be incompatible with the cabotage regulation because it believes that the flag state’s rules on wage conditions should apply to mainland cabotage. ESA also considered that the draft could constitute an unjustified restriction on Regulation 4055/86 concerning cross-border maritime transport services.

Parties who consider the new rules problematic may seek legal clarification and test their compatibility with EU/EEA law through two alternative routes: by submitting a complaint to ESA or by filing a lawsuit in Norwegian courts, requesting already in the statement of claim that the district court seek an advisory opinion from the EFTA Court.