I'm just catching up with this particular topic, whilst looking (as usual) for something else.

Some thirty years ago, I went on a 'Western Mediterranean' cruise on the QE2. My now wife was then a Merchant Navy Officer onboard, so I was invited to many cocktail parties, as a guest. The catering staff were generally of Filipino or east European origin - the two waiters at our table in the dining room were Serbo-Croat, as they told us, lamenting the current troubles in their homeland at that time.
I'm not saying it was right - it was just the economic reality at that time: employ domestic staff as cheap as you can, long before the minimum wage and all that.