BL Premium reports that the Independent Municipal and Allied Trade Union (Imatu) has urged municipalities to not abuse an exemption clause in the recently signed wage deal and has promised to oppose any frivolous applications by councils to be exempted from the terms of the agreement.

The SA Local Government Association (Salga), Imatu and the SA Municipal Workers Union (Samwu) signed a five-year wage deal on Friday that will give SA’s estimated 300,000 municipal workers wage increases of 6% in the first year and consumer price inflation (CPI) linked increases over the next four years. As required in terms of the Labour Relations Act as well as the constitution of the SA Local Government Bargaining Council (Salgbc), the wage agreement contains an exemption procedure for municipalities that cannot afford the increases. Imatu’s Johan Koen explained that parties to the bargaining council had, from this year, introduced a new mediation process for exemptions. “Once an exemption application is received, the SA Local Governing Bargaining Council must appoint a mediator who must attempt to resolve the application by mediation within 30-days, unless the parties agree to a longer period. If mediation fails, the exemption application must be heard and determined by the arbitrator, assisted by the financial expert within 30 days,” he advised. Koen went on to warn: “Imatu will oppose exemption applications should we find, after we have examined the financial statements, that the municipality can in fact afford the increases. However, we have noted that some municipalities who are not happy with the terms of the agreement have in the past used exemptions as a means to effectively renegotiate the agreement.”   He urged municipalities to only apply for exemption if they genuinely could not afford the increases.

• Read the full original of the report in the above regard by Luyolo Mkentane at BusinessLive (subscriber access only)

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