TimesLIVE reports that Labour Court acting judge Sean Snyman on Friday gave reasons as to why on 10 October he had dismissed a recent application by the National Union of Metalworkers of SA (Numsa) against BMW.
One of the reasons was that Numsa deliberately designed its application against BMW to try to scupper the disciplinary proceedings the company had instituted against hundreds of workers, with the view to compelling BMW to negotiate some alternative resolution other than dismissing the union’s members. The company had begun disciplinary processes against 224 of about 500 workers who were being charged for fraudulent medical aid claims made against BMW’s Employee Medical Aid Society (Bemas). The disciplinary process relating to these charges commenced about a month previously and was still ongoing. Numsa sought to interdict BMW from proceeding with the disciplinary process against its members as well as order that it be afforded 14 days to make written representations relevant to some of its members. “Truth be told, this is an application that never should have been brought, especially not by a long standing and experienced trade union such as (Numsa),” Snyman stated on Friday. He noted that Numsa was in essence asking the court to micromanage internal disciplinary proceedings in an individual employer while such proceedings were still ongoing. “(Numsa) does this despite the plethora of authorities indicating that as a matter of principle, such kind of intervention is not appropriate and should be discouraged.” Snyman said it was not necessary for him to decide whether any of Numsa’s members had committed the misconduct concerned, or whether their dismissal would be justified or fair as that was “squarely the task” of the arbitrator in any ultimate unfair dismissal proceedings.
- Read the full original of the report in the above regard by Ernest Mabuza at TimesLIVE
- Read too, Numsa suffers blow in Labour Court amid BMW medical aid scheme fraud probe, at The Citizen
Get other news reports at the SA Labour News home page