A crew member tells you she has worked nineteen days straight without a proper rest period and is running on empty. She thinks that is just yachting. It is not just yachting, and it is not just a wellbeing problem — it is a compliance one, and there is a framework that says so.
Why regulation belongs in a wellbeing course
Because it turns "be nicer to crew" into an obligation the vessel already carries. The Maritime Labour Convention 2006 (MLC) is the international standard governing seafarers working and living conditions, and most commercial yachts are covered by it. It gives you and your colleagues something firmer than goodwill to point at.
What MLC gives crew
| Area | What it means in practice |
|---|---|
| Hours of rest | Minimum rest periods must be respected and recorded honestly. Falsified rest hours are a safety and compliance failure, not a clever workaround. |
| Accommodation and food | Decent living space, bedding, and adequate provisions — the daily conditions that make a long season survivable. |
| Health protection and medical care | Crew are entitled to medical care, including access to medical advice while at sea. |
| On-board complaints procedure | Every covered vessel must have a written complaints procedure that crew can use without fear of victimisation, with a route to escalate ashore if it is not resolved onboard. |
| Repatriation | Crew have a right to be repatriated in defined circumstances, so leaving is not automatically ruinous. |
Amendments have increasingly recognised mental health, welfare and social connectivity — including access to communications — as part of a seafarer welfare, not an extra.
What this means for you
- Know that the complaints procedure exists. It is in the ship's documentation. Read it before you need it. It is your formal route for bullying, harassment, or hours-of-rest abuse.
- Rest hours are not a suggestion. If a colleague is being pressured to sign off inaccurate rest hours, that is a real issue with a real route.
- Welfare is the vessel obligation, not a favour. Captains and management companies carry a duty of care. Framing a concern in that language gets it taken seriously.
- Harassment has a route. You do not have to accept it as part of the job.
What it does not do
MLC does not make anyone happy, and it will not resolve a difficult conversation for you. Compliance is the floor, not the ceiling. A yacht can be perfectly compliant and still be a miserable place to live if the culture is poor. Knowing the framework simply means that when something is genuinely wrong, you are not relying on one person goodwill to fix it.
Onboard Notes
- MLC 2006 covers seafarer working and living conditions, and most commercial yachts fall under it.
- Key protections: hours of rest, accommodation, medical care, an onboard complaints procedure, and repatriation.
- Read the complaints procedure before you need it.
- Compliance is a floor, not a culture. Both matter.
- Preparatory study only. Not a certificate and not clinical training. Recognise, listen, signpost, escalate - never diagnose, treat or counsel.