-
Numsa members picket during a strike action.
Judgment has been reserved in the Labour Court matter between ArcelorMittal South Africa and the National Union of Metalworkers of South Africa.
Arcelor approached the Labour Court on an urgent basis to interdict the ongoing strike at its Coke plant.
Numsa members have downed tools over job cuts, affecting some of the company’s operations in Vanderbijlpark.
The strike action follows the company’s decision to retrench 107 workers ahead of Christmas.
Arcelor Mital SA argued that the mass retrenchment was covered in the collective agreement on dispute resolutions and that the workers should have opted for private mediation instead of strike action.
This was challenged by Numsa’s lawyer advocate Ashley Cook.
“How can there be strict compliance with the collective agreement when the LRA makes no provision for a referral of this dispute? If your lordship says that we need to comply with the dispute resolution, we have the meeting, and then we can’t resolve it and then according to the strict compliance, we need to refer to the bargaining council,” says Cook.
He says the court can only order compliance with a resolution process that is for in the Labour Relations Act.
“That adds substance to the argument as raised in the answering affidavit. This collective agreement does not make provision for strikes relating to the mass retrenchments,” he says.
NUMSA members picket outside ArcelorMittal offices:
