Telkom waging a war against its own employees – Solidarity

23 March 2016

Trade union Solidarity today accused Telkom of waging a war against its own employees. Solidarity says Telkom, among other things, leaves no room for proper consultation about its current retrenchment process with trade unions. Moreover, the way in which Telkom is dealing with this year’s wage negotiations is not fair in the least.  

“At the moment, four different labour processes are under way at Telkom, namely a section 189 retrenchment process, wage negotiations, two section 197 business transfer processes and a process concerning voluntary severance packages which started on Friday. If Telkom gets its way each of these processes holds negative consequences for employees,” Marius Croucamp, Deputy General Secretary for the Communications Industry at Solidarity, warned.

Croucamp says Telkom is trying its best to undermine trade unions by, among other things, enforcing four processes simultaneously and by failing to provide unions with sufficient information. “Telkom is clearly trying its best to make life difficult for trade unions. Delegates of the various trade unions have to stretch themselves to be able to attend all the meetings about the various processes. Telkom is exploiting the situation,” Croucamp says.

Croucamp says Solidarity is already in the process of obtaining legal advice should Telkom continue to enforce the above mentioned processes without the necessary consultation.

Wage negotiations 

In its opening offer during this year’s wage negotiations, Telkom proposed no increase in terms of fixed earnings. This means that employees’ salary increases will be linked to their performance.

“We believe that the latter is unfair because in terms of an agreement between trade unions and Telkom, workers should receive a salary increase on 1 April this year. Therefore, it is also not clear whether the employees’ increase will be linked to last year’s performance. If that is the case, employees were unaware of this arrangement and could therefore not adjust their performance accordingly,” Croucamp said.

In addition, Telkom postponed this year’s negotiations for several months. In terms of its recognition agreement with Telkom, Solidarity declared a dispute with Telkom in this regard last month.

Section 189 retrenchment process

Croucamp says it appears as if Telkom does not want to consult properly with trade unions about the company’s retrenchment process which affects 300 employees, and that it wants to rush it through.

“Telkom’s actions are unfair in the sense that the company’s time frame within which it wants to conclude the process does not correspond with that of the trade unions. We have only one goal in mind and that is to protect the work of our members. To do that we need all the relevant information and there has to be sufficient consultation with Telkom about the process,” Croucamp says.

Meanwhile, Telkom has already started to finalise three new operating models which are believed to be the rationale for the retrenchment process. Telkom is, however, refusing to disclose information about this to trade unions.

“It is clear that Telkom wants to impose an irrational retrenchment process at all cost without consulting with trade unions in a proper way about the rationale of the process. This comes while the negative effects of Telkom’s previous retrenchment processes are already being felt and the company now has to hire contract employees to do the work of those who have been retrenched previously,” Croucamp said.

Voluntary severance packages and voluntary early retirement packages

As was the case last year, Telkom made voluntary severance packages available to employees on Friday without consulting with the unions on this issue in any way. “Telkom is exploiting the fact that employees are now vulnerable and uncertain about their future at the company. It is a fact that no-one can take well-considered, rational decisions about their future when they are emotionally traumatised,” Croucamp said.

Section 197 business transfer process

By May this year, Telkom wants to transfer 260 employees in its Shared Services Division to WNS SA, an outsourcing company. “Solidarity is by no means in accordance with Telkom’s decision to transfer employees to WNS. Former Telkom employees transferred in October last year, are currently working in adverse and uncertain working conditions. Several of the 255 Telkom employees who were transferred last year have subsequently been retrenched,” Croucamp said.

Issued by Marius Croucamp, Deputy General Secretary: Solidarity, 23 March 2016