Workplace legislation

Hundreds of foreign workers are currently confined to fishing vessels in Honolulu for years at a time. Legislation introduced last Thursday in Congress could change the way the system works.

The Sustainable Fishing Workforce Protection Act would offer workplace protections a year after the AP’s investigation found that the fleet is crewed by about 700 men who are confined to their boats for the duration of their contracts, often a year or two at a time.

The bill would close a loophole in the law that has allowed the Hawaii fleet to employ the workers for a fraction of the pay an American worker would get, in part by collecting them by boat from Pacific islands.