collective agreements - interpretation
10 April 2007

Public Service Association on behalf of Tiltman and Statistics South Africa concerned the terms of a collective agreement which gave the employer, on application, a discretion to grant employees temporary incapacity leave on full pay. In arbitration proceedings the arbitrator held that the employer could not exercise that discretion at any time that it chose, but must do so before the leave was granted. The agreement did not allow the employer to decide later, when an employee was medically boarded, to set off benefits due to him at that stage against paid sick leave that he had already been granted.

In Mahlangu v Telkom SA the CCMA found that the employer party had not complied fully with all the requirements of a collective agreement when assessing the performance of an employee for the purpose of granting him a salary increase and bonus. As a result the employee was not timeously made aware of his shortcomings, and suffered prejudice. The commissioner found it clear that the employee had not in fact reached his performance targets and did not order the employer to pay the relevant salary increases, but instead awarded compensation for the breach. The Labour Court also in Food & Allied Workers Union v Commission for Conciliation, Mediation & Arbitration & others considered the correct interpretation of a collective agreement prescribing rates of pay for employees on Sundays and public holidays.
 
Industrial Law Journal, February preview, Juta