The Philippine Supreme Court has recently clarified its controversial ruling on the "120 days issue".
The Supreme Court had held in Crystal Shipping that on Philippine Labour law principles a seafarer unable to perform customary work for more than 120 days is permanently disabled. The court had declined to consider the POEA standard employment contract. As a consequence a seafarer unable to work for 120 days was entitled to a contractual disability payment of US$60,000. (This decision was reported in Sea Venture issue 6 and see "Crew Claims in the Philippines"
The decision had caused considerable concern, not least because of the consequent costs of employing crew from the Philippines. Various manning organisations intervened in the subsequent Remigio case to stress the importance of the issue to the industry.
In it’s recent resolution on a Motion for Clarification in Crystal Shipping the Court has now stated "admittedly POEA Memorandum Circular No. 55, series of 1996 does not measure disability in terms of number of days but by gradings only".
Therefore, the latest ruling in Crystal Shipping provides room to argue that disability cannot be measured in terms of the number of days during which the seafarer is ill or injured or is unable to work but should be assessed dependent on the views of a doctor and based on the POEA Schedule of Disability.
At present the Remigio case is still pending resolution. However, taking a cue from the new resolution in Crystal Shipping, it is to be hoped that the Court will take the opportunity of the Remigio case to address fully the "120 days issue" and to apply the grading approach to the assessment of claims for disability.
We are grateful to Ruben Del Rosario of Del Rosario and Del Rosario for this article.
