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BL Premium reports that the Constitutional Court has been told that public sector unions rejected the state’s attempts at a compromise over wage demands and have missed the boat as resources have since been diverted to fighting the Covid-19 pandemic.
This was indicated in an answering affidavit filed by Yoliswa Makhasi, director-general of the Department of Public Service & Administration. The unions approached the court in January for leave to appeal against a Labour Appeal Court judgment which declared a multi-year wage agreement signed in 2018 unlawful, meaning the National Treasury did not have to honour the last leg of a three-year wage deal. The government had tried to reprioritise funds to reach a compromise but the unions had rejected this “with contempt”, Makhasi said. “It is now too late. There is no money that can be reprioritised,” she indicated. The unions have asked the apex court to declare the original collective agreement lawful and constitutionally valid, as well as to order the government to meet its obligations in a staggered or phased way. They also want the court to order the state and unions to return to the negotiating table. But Makhasi argued there was no prospect of success. She said the government in May 2020 had made a revised proposal in conciliation at the bargaining council, in which it said the only alternative was to make R10bn which would have provided for pay progression over the entire public service for the 2019/2020 performance cycle, and an additional R3.5bn from cuts and savings from other programmes, such as school feeding schemes, available to the bargaining unit. While there would then have been no pay progression, the total amount would have been paid as a cash gratuity to the employees in the bargaining unit. The state had also proposed granting an additional number of leave days for use or encashment at exit from the job. Makhasi said it was made clear to the unions that the proposal might not be available later if they rejected it.
- Read the full original of the report in the above regard by Claudi Mailovich at BusinessLive (paywall access only)
Get other news reports at the SA Labour News home page