News24 reports that the Labour Court (LC) has ordered ArcelorMittal SA (AMSA) to reinstate all workers who were unfairly dismissed from the steelmaker’s Newcastle and Vereeniging long-steel mills earlier this month.

The decision on Monday comes after the National Union of Metalworkers of SA (Numsa) approached the court to urgently compel AMSA to issue a fresh section 189 retrenchment notice, or to at least engage in further consultations relating to the last retrenchment notice that was issued in January this year. The union claimed that AMSA had unilaterally terminated the consultation process on retrenchments at the beginning of March after “major intervening events and developments”. Failure to find a long-term solution for the long-steel business resulted in its closure earlier this month.

Numsa argued that AMSA’s rejection of a subsequent R8.5-billion offer to purchase needed to be properly ventilated and consulted upon, as they present possible alternatives to job losses. The LC ruled that AMSA should conduct further consultations; that no further dismissals were to take place until this consultation process was completed; and that employees already dismissed should be reinstated. AMSA has applied for leave to appeal the decision, with the effect of such an application suspending the court order.

• Read the full original of the report in the above regard by Lisa Steyn at News24 (subscription / trial registration required)
• Read too, Labour Court orders ArcelorMittal to reinstate retrenched workers, at IOL Business
• And also, Steelmaker Amsa faces nationalisation calls amid job cuts, at BusinessDay

Get other news reports at the SA LabourNews home page