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Article 13/2026

Employment equity compliance certificates will be issued if a designated employer achieves the annual and eventual sectoral targets by 2030.  Such compliance certificates will also be issued if there are justifiable reasonable grounds for non-compliance in terms of Regulation 16(5) of Government Gazette 52515 of 15 April 2025 (Gazette 2).  If these grounds exist, an employer will therefore be able to justify why it deviated from its employment equity targets. 

What are these justifiable reasonable grounds for not complying with employment equity targets?

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Regulation 16(5) of Gazette 2 contains the following grounds:

  • insufficient recruitment opportunities – the lack of recruitment opportunities simply means the designated employer has been deprived of the opportunity of filling identified positions so as to ensure compliance with the employment equity plan targets
  • insufficient promotion opportunities – in short, a flat, horizontal organisational structure does not create the same promotion opportunities as a vertical organisational structure
  • insufficient target individuals from designated groups with relevant formal qualifications, prior learning, relevant experience or the capacity to acquire, within a reasonable time period, the ability to do the job – employment equity is not about filling positions from designated groups, but filling such positions with suitably qualified people from such designated groups (at all occupational levels in the workplace). There is no duty on a designated employer to fill positions unless the incumbents are indeed suitably qualified people in terms of s20(3), read with s20(4), of the EEA
  • impact of CCMA award/court order
  • transfer of businesses
  • mergers/acquisitions
  • impact of economic conditions on the employer

The harsh reality is that no business will be in a recruitment and employment mode if fertile economic conditions do not exist.

July 20, 2026

Precautionary suspensions

In the public sector, the Senior Management Service Handbook (SMS Handbook) directly addresses precautionary suspensions and the 60-day time limit.

Clause 2.7(2)(c) of the SMS Handbook provides that ‘If a member is suspended or transferred as a precautionary measure, the employer must hold a disciplinary hearing within 60 days. The chair of the hearing must then decide on any further postponement.’

Regulation 6 of the Local Government: Disciplinary Regulations Senior Managers, 2010 (Regulations) provides for the precautionary suspension of senior municipal employees and Regulation 6(6)(a) provides: ‘If a senior is suspended, a disciplinary hearing must commence within three months after the date of suspension, failing which the suspension will automatically lapse.’

What are the principles governing a determination of the question as to whether or not a senior municipal employee’s suspension automatically lapses in terms of the aforesaid Regulation 6(6)(a)?

Obviously, the answers to the aforesaid question are very relevant in the private sector where, firstly, a collective agreement regulates a similar process or, alternatively, such contractual rights have been created between the parties, to be enforced in terms of s77(3) of the BCEA.

July 13, 2026

In the previous article, we dealt with the consequences of a plant level collective agreement with a definite beginning and end date. We indicated to you that, in line with s23(2) of the LRA, and an analysis of the relevant case law, that, once such a collective agreement reaches its expiry date, it expires and is no longer of any force or effect. In this article, we deal with the scenario where a plant level collective agreement is concluded for an indefinite period and the employer gave notice to terminate same.

What are the consequences when a party to a plant level collective agreement, concluded for an indefinite time period, gives notice to terminate such collective agreement?

July 6, 2026

In terms of s23(2), a collective agreement binds, for the whole period of the collective agreement, every person so bound in terms of s23(1)(c) (the members of a registered trade union and the employers who are members of a registered employers’ organisation who are a party to the collective agreement, if the collective agreement regulates the terms and conditions of employment, or the conduct of the employers and employees) who was a member at the time it became binding, or who becomes a member after it became binding (irrespective of whether or not that person continues to be a member of such trade union or employers’ organisation for the duration of the collective agreement).

What is the relevant case law development as to a plant level collective agreement that has an expiry date, i e does such collective agreement continue to be of force and effect after such expiry date?