News24 reports that SA Breweries (SAB) will have to reinstate up to 188 warehouse workers, pending further consultation with them, after the Labour Court ruled that it had not followed a fair procedure before dismissing them.

On Friday, Judge Reynaud Daniels ruled in favour of the Food and Allied Workers Union (FAWU), which had taken SAB to court on an urgent basis to have workers affected by a recent round of retrenchments reinstated. SAB is the local unit of global brewing giant AB InBev. In reaching his decision, Daniels took issue with several procedural steps taken by SAB during the retrenchment process. He found that SAB had not disclosed all the relevant information needed for a meaningful consultation process. Also, the termination agreements were issued to the union without the names of the affected workers. This meant that workers did not have sufficient time to prepare for their impending retrenchment.

Daniels ordered SAB to reinstate workers who were FAWU members and who were affected by the Section 189 process. SAB will also be compelled to re-engage with FAWU in the way envisaged in the Labour Relations Act, and supply it with all the documents it relied upon to justify the changes to its logistics function,

• Read the full original of the report in the above regard by William Brederode at News24 (subscription / trial registration required)

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