Judgments

The Labour Appeal Court has delivered a judgment dealing with the intersection between inherent requirements of the job and operational requirements. The judgment dealt with a situation where the employer implemented a “Chinese model” and replaced South African employees with Chinese employees. Mr De Bruyn, one of the South African […]

The Labour Appeal Court has delivered a judgment on 2 July 2021, in Anglo American Platinum Limited v Beyers and Others, dealing with when it is permissible for employers in the private sector to engage in reviewing disciplinary hearing outcomes and altering the sanction imposed by the disciplinary chairperson. The […]

Up until now most categories of employees have been covered by COIDA, which provides for compensation for workers who are injured at work. A category of employees who have until now been excluded from this benefit are domestic workers. However, on Monday, 19 November 2020, the Constitutional Court confirmed application […]

The landmark Aveng v NUMSA Constitutional Court judgment was handed down today. It deals with when an employer may retrench employees who do not accept changes to their terms and conditions of employment. Section 187(1)(c) of the Labour Relations Act renders a dismissal automatically unfair if the reason for the […]

In Mthimkhulu v Standard Bank, the Labour Court recently dealt with the question: can a disciplinary hearing continue if an employee resigns? The issue arose in an urgent application heard by Moshoana J. Mr Mthimbulu, an aspirant advocate, was employed by Standard Bank. He was charged with misconduct and a […]

The Labour Appeal Court has delivered a judgment on the deeming provision in section 198A(3)(b) of the Labour Relations Act which applies to employees engaged through temporary employment services (commonly referred to as labour brokers).  The Chep labour broker judgment sets out the factors to determine whether a service provider […]

The Labour Appeal Court delivered a judgment on 10 September 2020, dismissing an appeal by AMCU against a Labour Court judgment on secondary strikes. The basis for AMCU’s secondary strike appeal was the argument the a union can call multiple secondary strikes simultaneously at different employers in the same industry. […]

The Constitutional Court has delivered judgment in Road Traffic Management Corporation vs Tasima; which involved a dispute relating to the application of section 197 of the Labour Relations Act to organs of state. Section 197 regulates the consequences of transfers of business as a going concern, and provides for employees’ contracts […]

On 8 July 2020, the Labour Appeal Court dismissed an appeal against a judgment of the Labour Court involving a retrenchment process at SAA. The LAC upheld the Labour Court’s finding that it was procedurally unfair to commence a retrenchment consultation process in terms of section 189 of the Labour […]