Cruise passengers 'held to ransom'
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Your support makes all the difference.Passengers stranded for two nights on a cruise liner in Madeira said today they were being "held to ransom".
Nearly 500 holidaymakers on the MV Van Gogh have been stuck in the Portuguese port of Funchal since Tuesday, because of a legal dispute.
They are in the final stages of a round-the-world voyage and were due back in Falmouth, Cornwall, on Saturday, but the timing of their return is now in doubt.
Actress Shirley Anne Field, who appeared in Alfie with Michael Caine, is one of the passengers. She said they were being well cared for.
Gladys Hobson, 64, and her husband Wallace said when the announcement was made on the ship's PA system, passengers thought it was an April Fools' joke.
She said some elderly passengers were concerned they could run out of medication if the dispute stretched on.
"We were all shocked. Our first reaction was that it was an April Fools' joke. Then we realised it was serious," she told the BBC.
Mrs Hobson, from Tyneside, said passengers felt stuck in the middle of a row that did not involve them.
"The passengers of this ship should not be made to suffer due to a dispute. They shouldn't be involving passengers," she said.
"We're in a beautiful place. You couldn't be in a better place to be held ransom."
The boat's owners, Van Gogh Cruises, which is based in Cheltenham and is a subsidiary of Dutch-owned Club Cruise, is in dispute with the administrators of the liner's former owners, Travelscope.
A spokesman for the firm said today he did not want the passengers to be used as "pawns".
Sales manager Tim Fleming said the administrators could have waited for the ship to return to Falmouth and then taken legal action.
"We do not want the passengers to be used as pawns. We want to get them home as soon as possible."
The company said it hopes the passengers will be home by Sunday evening.
The liner set off on January 4 from Falmouth for a trip costing up to £9,000 per person for the 460 passengers.
It took in the Mediterranean, Egypt, the Caribbean, Ecuador, Tahiti, New Zealand, Sydney, Mauritius and Cape Town.
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