Casual Workers Advice Offi ce The Purpose of this Book This book is aimed at advice offi ce workers. Its purpose it to help advice offi ce staff fi nd out if workers asking for advice about their working conditions or wages are covered by bargaining council agreements, by sectoral determinations or purely by the Basic Conditions of Employment Act. Bargaining council agreements are negotiated between trade unions and employer organisations in bargaining councils, which are set up in terms of the Labour Relations Act. These agreements set down minimum conditions of employment and minimum wages for workers in a particular sector, and are binding on all employers in that sector if the Minister of Labour extends the agreement to non-parties. Sectoral determinations are made by the Minister of Labour, and set minimum conditions of employment and wages for particular sectors of the economy. These determinations are made in terms of the Basic Conditions of Employment Act (BCEA). Workers who are not covered either by a bargaining council agreement or by a sectoral determination are covered by the BCEA. The BCEA sets minimum conditions of employment for all workers. It does not set minimum wages. This means that workers who are covered only by the BCEA do not have legislated minimum wages. Even workers who are covered by bargaining council agreements or sectoral determinations retain the protection of the BCEA where the agreements or determinations are silent on particular rights granted by the BCEA. This book does not deal with other rights workers have through labour laws like the Labour Relations Act, the Employment Equity Act and so on. 1 Casual Workers Advice Offi ce The Importance of the Book Being able to tell which agreements, determinations or laws cover particular workers is important for a number of reasons. Firstly, it will help to establish what rights such workers have. For example, when a domestic worker on a farm approaches an advice offi ce about what their monthly wages should be, the book will tell the advice offi ce that such a worker is covered by the Farm Worker sectoral determination and not the Domestic Worker sectoral determination, as could be expected. The minimum wage for a domestic worker on a farm is R1503.90, whereas the minimum wages of a domestic worker in a rural area not working on a farm is R1376.25. In the context of such generally low wages, the difference of R127.65 is signifi cant.The book is also important for deciding where workers should go to resolve disputes with their employers. Disputes involving unfair dismissal or underpayment of wages, for example, must be referred to different institutions, depending on whether a worker falls under a bargaining council or not. This is sometimes referred to as the question of jurisdiction. A worker who wants to contest an unfair dismissal but who is covered by a bargaining council will refer the dispute to the bargaining council, and not the CCMA. Similarly, if the worker’s dispute is about underpayment of wages, that worker will refer such a dispute to the bargaining council as well, and not a Labour Centre of the Department of Labour. The book will prevent or at least minimize workers being referred to the wrong institutions for help in resolving their problems. 2 Casual Workers Advice Offi ce How to Use the Book The book is made up of 3 parts. Part 1 consists of a subject index, Part 2 sets out which workers are covered by bargaining council agreements and sectoral determinations, referred to as the Scope of Application in the agreements and determinations. Part 2 also includes defi nitions of the industries. Part 3 contains addresses and contact details for bargaining councils and all registered trade unions nationally. It is important for users of the book to use Parts 1 and 2 in conjunction with each other. Part 1 – The Subject Index The Subject Index assists the user to identify if the sector a worker seeking advice is from is covered by a bargaining council agreement, a sectoral determination or by the BCEA. The Index is organized alphabetically, starting with Accessories, Motor Vehicles through to Yoghurt! In the column next to Accessories, Motor Vehicles the reader will fi nd Motor Industry B/C. This means that the manufacture of motor vehicle accessories is covered by the Motor Industry bargaining council agreement. In some instances, the Subject Index will refl ect more than one bargaining council agreement covering a particular sector. Or it may say that the bargaining council agreements and the BCEA apply. The reason for this is that some council agreements apply only to certain areas. Workers in the excluded areas would then be covered by the BCEA. For example, building workers are covered by a number of regional bargaining council agreements. But no bargaining council agreements exist for areas like Gauteng or Mpumalanga. This means that building workers in Gauteng and Mpumalanga are covered only by the provisions of the BCEA. It further means that no minimum wages exist for such workers. Bargaining council agreements can be extended to non-parties. This means that employers and unions who were not part of entering into the agreement are also bound by its provisions. But some agreements are not extended. Workers to whom the agreement is not extended will in such a case be covered by the provisions of the BCEA. Part 2 will clarify which workers are covered by the agreement and which are not. 3 Casual Workers Advice Offi ce In future editions of this book, the Subject Index will indicate if a particular bargaining council agreement is extended to non-parties or not, as an early alert to the user that not all employers and workers in a particular sector may be covered by the provisions of a particular bargaining council agreement. Below we will explain the importance of Part 2, which includes the scope of agreements and determinations, as well as the defi nitions of the sectors covered by these, for establishing what a particular worker is covered by. The Subject Index is useful because workers don’t necessarily know how the sector they work in is classifi ed. Workers best know the job the do and the materials they work with. The Subject Index thus allows for establishing the sector and whether a bargaining council agreement, a sectoral determination or the BCEA applies to a particular worker. 4 Casual Workers Advice Offi ce Part 2 – Which Workers are Covered and Defi nitions of Sectors Part 2A of the book sets out which workers are covered by particular sectoral determinations and the gives the defi nition of the sector the determination applies to. Part 2B sets out which workers are covered by particular bargaining council agreements and defi nes the sector each agreement covers. It is important to read Part 2 of the book in conjunction with Part 1. The Subject Index in Part 1 is useful for telling the user whether bargaining council agreements or sectoral determinations apply to a particular industry or sector. It does not automatically mean that the particular worker asking for advice is covered by those agreements or determinations. Part 2 tells the user which workers are covered by bargaining council agreements and sectoral determinations. In the earlier example above of a domestic worker working on a farm, the Subject Index will tell us that the Domestic Worker and Farm Worker sectoral determinations apply to domestic work. It is by reading who is covered by these two sectoral determinations in Part 2 of the book that the user will discover that a domestic worker on a farm is covered by the Farm Worker sectoral determination, and not the Domestic Worker one. We have included 2 quick checklists at the beginning of Part 2. The fi rst contains all the bargaining councils nationally, and the areas covered by each. The second checklist contains all the sectoral determinations and the Expanded Public Works Programme ministerial determination and the areas they cover. Part 2 also includes defi nitions of industries. This is useful to establish that the work the worker does indeed falls within the bargaining council agreement or sectoral determination. The defi nitions in some cases also include defi nitions of areas. Many bargaining council agreements and some of the sectoral determinations set different wages for workers living in different areas, even if they are doing the same work. These are sometimes referred alphabetically, like Area A, Area B, Area C and so on, or numerically, like Area 1, Area 2, Area 3, with different minimum wages prescribed for the different areas. It is important to check which area a worker falls in for cases involving queries over wages. The book allows users to do so without having to check the actual bargaining council agreement or sectoral determination. 5 Casual Workers Advice Offi ce Part 3 – Addresses and Contact Details This part of the book is self-explanatory. It contains the addresses and contact details for all bargaining councils and registered trade unions nationally. In future editions of the book we hope to include regional and/or local contact details for national bargaining councils and trade unions. The accompanying DVD includes this information but also has the contact details for the Department of Labour and the CCMA (see below). Exclusion of the Public Sector The public sector has been excluded from this edition of the book. The public sector bargaining council agreements are as yet not consolidated. Instead, they exist in the form of numerous and scattered resolutions. This makes working with the agreements very diffi cult.