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Talks between Telkom and unions collapse

Johannesburg - Discussions between Telkom and trade unions have fallen through over the telecom company’s plan to cut thousands of jobs.

Earlier this month, Telkom announced that it plans to cut 4 400 jobs through voluntary severance packages or voluntary early retirement packages. Telkom also said that 3 400 employees will be transferred to outsourced companies as part of an enterprise development programme.

After making the announcement, Telkom entered into talks with trade unions, but those talks have now subsequently collapsed.

“Despite a number of meetings over the past two weeks, Telkom and the Communication Workers Union, Solidarity and South Africa Communications Union have been unable to reach agreement on a process to progress this critical next step in Telkom’s multi-year turnaround programme, and organised labour have declined to accept the offer of opening VSPs (voluntary severance packages) and VERPs (voluntary early retirement packages) across the impacted areas of the business,” said Telkom in a statement on Friday.

“For this reason, engagements have been halted and Telkom will be approaching the Centre for Conciliation, Mediation and Arbitration (CCMA) to facilitate further engagements. The progression to the CCMA implies a formal, facilitated consultation process in accordance with the Labour Relations Act,” said Telkom.

Telkom further said that it will subsequently be proceeding with the “issuing of a Section 189 notices for the areas affected by the Telkom 2.0 turnaround programme”.

Section 189 is a part of labour law that deals with retrenchments.

Unions’ joint statement

In a joint statement, the South African Communications Union (Sacu), Solidarity and the Communication Workers Union (CWU) said that in November 2008 an agreement was reached with Telkom on a restructuring forum format.

“In terms of this agreement any contemplated restructuring need to be discussed/engaged on in a meaningful manner within the restructuring forum,” said the unions in a statement on Friday.

The joint statement also said that in September 2014 Telkom agreed to include unions in the “reorganising” of the telecoms company.

But the unions in their joint statement said that Telkom has turned its back on the restructuring forum.

“On a request from organised labour for additional information to empower labour in engaging the company meaningfully the response from the company was that the information was not relevant to the restructuring forum,” said the unions in their joint statement on Friday.

The unions also said they haven’t been given sufficient input on Telkom’s turnaround plan.

“It is glaringly obvious, the company have (sic) failed to comply with the restructuring forum agreement,” said the statement.

“It leaves us therefore with no alternative but to dispute the current restructuring process presented to organised labour on 18th of June 2015 (reconvened meeting of the 9th of June 2015).

“It is important to note that no labour contingent was afforded the opportunity to present any counter proposals to Telkom’s proposed Telkom Turnaround Strategy 2.0,” said the unions.

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