It has come to the attention of the United National Transport Union (UNTU), that some of our members in Bombela misinterpreted the previous circular letter, regarding the Labour Court ruling against Bombela.
UNTU has not yet won the overtime case, but has won the first round of the court proceedings. The merit of UNTU’s case against Bombela still needs to be heard by the Labour Court.
Judge Robert Lagrange granted UNTU leave to amend its statement of claim in the Labour Court in Johannesburg, to include new information and developments which has come to the attention of the Union, over the past four years. This will include the rectification of the wording of the claim, which currently only makes provision for train drivers and not the rest of the operational staff.
Lagrange ruled that he was of the view that UNTU’s original claim did include the content of the Working Hours Policy, which was amended by Bombela in an e-mail which reflected changes to the terms and conditions of employment of UNTU members.
The ruling comes after Bombela opposed UNTU’s request and argued on a technical issue that UNTU’s original claim did not, amongst others, specify that it relied on a contract and/or the existence of an agreement in the overtime issue.
Operational staff at Bombela has a 40-hour working week, however since May 2013 they are only being paid overtime once they had worked more than 48 hours a week.
Steve Harris, General Secretary of UNTU, says the Union is of the view that Bombela’s Working Hours Policy permits operational staff to be paid overtime for work exceeding 40 hours per week.
Lagrange instructed both parties to hold a pre-trial meeting and file the minutes thereof, by 14 March before the merits of the claim will be heard. This is done so that the parties can agree what is in dispute and what is not, in order to speed up the proceedings.
Harris says the Union will apply to the court to allocate an expedited trial date for the hearing of the merits of the case, since it has been dragging on since 2014. UNTU would like to see the case finalised in the next few months.
Issued by Sonja Carstens, Media, Liaison and Communication Officer at UNTU.
