INSTITUTE OF EMPLOYMENT RIGHTS COMPARATIVE NOTES 4
trade union rights in South Africa: the Labour Relations Act 1995 ROGER WELCH
about the author Roger Welch is senior lecturer in law at the Portsmouth Business School, University of Portsmouth. This publication, like all publications of the Institute, represents not the collective views of the Institute but only the views of the author. The responsibility of the Institute is limited to approving its publication as worthy of consideration within the labour movement.
trade union rights in South Africa: the Labour Relations Act 1995 ROGER WELCH
Institute of Employment Rights Comparative notes ISBN 1 873271 74 3 February 2000 177 Abbeville Road London SW4 9RL 020 7498 6919 fax 020 7498 9080 email ier@gn.apc.org www.ier.org.uk printed by Upstream (TU) 020 7207 1560 £5 for trade unions and students £10 others
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acknowledgements I would like to give special thanks to Andrew Caiger, my good friend and former colleague at the Anglia Law School, for organising the research project and visit to South Africa in May 1996 which made this paper possible. I would also like to express my gratitude to Robert Kettles, University of the North West, and Evance Kalula, Director of the Labour Law Unit at the University of Cape Town, for their help in providing perspectives and materials on the LRA. In particular, I would like to thank David Woolfrey and Paul Benjamin for their invaluable assistance in the writing of this paper through the provision of information on the LRA since it came into effect. I would also like to thank Ann Ridley, University of Portsmouth, and Bob Simpson, London School of Economics, for their comments on previous drafts. As ever, any illogicalities, inaccuracies or errors are entirely my responsibility.
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introduction In the years since Nelson Mandela walked free from prison, on 11 February 1990, South Africa has been transformed from an apartheid authoritarian state into a multiracial democracy. A major part of this fundamental transformation has been the emergence of a new industrial relations system predominantly implemented by the Labour Relations Act 1995 (LRA). The LRA has been proclaimed as being amongst “the world’s most progressive labour legislation. Its provisions on a range of fronts – protection of strikers, entrenchment of organisational rights, disclosure of information, codetermination rights, promotion of centralised bargaining – equals and goes beyond even what has been won by workers in the social democracies of Europe and Scandinavia.”1 In contrast, as a result of Conservative legislation between 1980 and 1993 trade union law in the UK (notwithstanding the new Employment Relations Act 1999) is in significant ways in violation of the international legal standards laid down by the International Labour Organisation (ILO). The objectives of this paper are twofold: (a) to explain the provisions of the LRA so that trade unionists, labour lawyers and industrial relations academics and practitioners in the UK can draw their own conclusions as to whether in whole or part the LRA can provide a model for prounion labour law reform in Britain; (b) to contribute to such discussion by comparing UK law, including relevant provisions in the Employment Relations Act 1999, with the LRA and providing a tentative assessment of the impact that the LRA has had in South Africa since it came into force in November 1996. One feature of the LRA which will immediately stand out in comparison with the UK is the degree of compulsory state intervention in South African industrial relations. It is therefore useful to provide a brief account of the legal and political backcloth to the enactment of the LRA. In order to understand the operation of the Act it is also necessary to provide some explanation of the new institutions that the LRA has created.
1: Von Holdt, K. (1995) ‘The LRA Agreement, “Worker Victory” or “Miserable Compromise”?’, SA Labour Bulletin, vol. 19, no. 4.: 16-26. For an analysis of the law prior to the LRA 1995, see Brassey, M., Cameron, E. and Cheadle, H. (1987) The New Labour Law: Strikes, Dismissals and the Unfair Industrial Practice in South African Law.
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Trade Union Rights in South Africa: the Labour Relations Act 1995 is the fourth in a series of Comparative notes published by the Institute of Employment Rights. The Institute was launched in February 1989. As a labour law “think tank” , supported by the trade union movement its purpose is to provide research, ideas and detailed argument. This series of comparative notes was introduced in an attempt to offer an insight into how labour law is developing throughout the world and to provide UK unions with positive examples of how the law can operate to the benefit of workers and their unions. The Institute does not assume that legal measures can offer ultimate solutions for political, economic and social problems. However, it recognises that law has a part to play in influencing the employment relationship, both individually and collectively. Institute of Employment Rights 177 Abbeville Road, London SW4 9RL
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