In spite of its reputation as a conservative industry, shipping has a long record of technological innovation and advance. It would be wrong to portray seafarers and their unions as Luddites opposed to all forms of new technology.

History shows how adaptive and resilient mariners can be and in most cases these advances have been embraced, not least when they have been shown to deliver improvements in safety or living and working conditions on board ship.

However, I don’t believe it is right that we just sit back and let the tide of progress sweep over us. I’m certainly concerned about the way that some of the debate over autonomous shipping has unfolded so far.

The torrent of trials and projects that hogged the headlines over the past year has lacked a sense of the human element. To us, it seems that much is being driven by equipment manufacturers and potential service suppliers – with the result that the agenda has concentrated on systems rather than their potential social and human impact.

We must remember that the introduction of some new systems and equipment in the past has not been painless and that some technologies have not been successful, especially when retro-fitted.

The shipping industry and those who regulate it need to exercise caution in the adoption of autonomous ships – acknowledging that changes should be evaluated at every stage. This process should begin now, with analysis of the existing impact of automation – and most notably to assess it as a factor within accident investigation reports. There is an urgent need for research to assess these critically important factors. Too often, accidents are written off as being the consequence of “human factors” when, in reality, issues such as ergonomics, equipment design and training are of crucial significance.

Despite the zeal of the equipment and systems manufacturers, I suspect that the adoption of autonomous ships will be driven largely by economics. ‘Smart ships’ and the supporting infrastructure will require huge amounts of investment and savings on labour may be marginal, given the relatively low cost of many seafarers in the global maritime labour market. However, I would argue that economics should not be the core criterion influencing the adoption of autonomous systems – it should be safety.

Nautilus believes there is worrying evidence already that safety is taking second place in the debate. There’s no sense of a considered approach to the implications for people, and there’s a danger that the fragmented and uncoordinated use of big data could prove counter-productive.

We have the potential to use technology to advantage – to make the lives of seafarers not only safer but qualitatively better. We’ve all heard the repeated complaints about the burden of paperwork at sea these days – why are we not better harnessing IT to eliminate those tedious tasks?

I want to see more of a debate about the potential for technology to improve the nature of work for maritime professionals – emphasising the ‘high tech’ nature of the sector and removing some of the inherently unsafe aspects of work at sea.

Properly managed, the transition to ‘smart’ shipping operations will not mean the demise of seafaring but instead could lead to the creation of different ways of working, such as new specialist ship ‘operators’ and ‘maintainers’ based at sea and ashore.

During the transitional period, new technologies offer significant potential to improve safety – with intelligent use of sensors and diagnostic tools being of considerable help to deck and engineering departments in supporting decision-making and situational awareness.

Done properly, new skills for new technologies have the potential to create better paid employment, reflecting the increasing scarcity of specialist staff to construct, fit out, operate, and maintain these new systems. As with the first industrial revolution, there is an opportunity to create and develop new specialist skills.

Let’s not forget, for instance, the recent evolution of the electro-technical officer – a post that my union battled to secure for many years before its formal STCW recognition in 2010. The work that we did to create a training and certification structure to reflect the skills and expertise of electronic specialists on board provide a model for the essential work that lies ahead to ensure that there is appropriate training, skills and knowledge to safely operate new systems and to provide the necessary underpinning seafaring expertise for remote and autonomous maritime operations.

I get the sense that there are exciting opportunities out there. Virtual reality training, augmented reality operations, and science fiction is becoming a scientific fact.

Done well, Nautilus believes those opportunities could transform the external perception of the maritime profession – putting seafarers and the maritime sector where they should be, as a high-tech and high-skills industry.