Family responsibility leave is governed by section 27 of Basic Conditions of Employment Act 1997. Employees are entitled to 3 days of family responsibility leave per year, should the employee meet certain criteria: The employee must be a full-time or permanent employee;The employee must work over four days per week;The employee is only entitled to family responsibility leave after four months of employment. However, an employer and employee may contractually agree that over three family...

Termination of the employment relationship can take place in different ways. A few to mention may be in the event of a death of an employee, by the employee’s dismissal, when an employee retires, by mutual agreement or on the instance of an employee. If an employee resigns, the employee would have to provide an advanced notice period to the employer. The notice period is, however, dependent on several factors: First, if there is no contract of employment between the employer and employee...

Section 200 of the Labour Relations Act states that a registered trade union or registered employers’ organisation may act as representatives to employees in workplace disputes. In Calgan Lounge v EFF & Others (J2648/18), handed down in the Labour Court, the EFF’s role in workplace issues was considered. A political party cannot derive powers to interfere in the workplace from the Constitution, as the rights in the Constitution are given effect to in the LRA, specifically designated to...

Dismissal for petty theft has always been a severe debatable issue in the labour field. In the case of Nando’s Scottsville v CCMA and Others (D06/2019), an employee was dismissed for eating two individual slices of carrots from the bain-marie. The employee was charged with the following: ‘Unauthorised Consumption of Company Stock – in that they alleged that  the employee was dishonest by consuming company stock being vegetables whilst on duty on the 08/04/2018 at Nando’s Scotville.’ The...

In terms of Labour Law, there is a difference between the termination of an employment contract and the concept of dismissal. An employee claiming unfair dismissal must establish the existence of dismissal, and it is the onus of the employee to prove the existence of a dismissal, which is not necessarily unfair. Any form of dismissal must be procedurally and substantively fair, and focus is placed on the following six examples in terms of the meaning of dismissal. Termination of employment by...