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Article 66/2022

What is the difference between a lockout and a shut-out?

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  • The definition of a ‘lockout’, in terms of s213 of the LRA, read together with the definition of ‘issue in dispute’, entails the exclusion by an employer of employees from the employer’s workplace with the purpose of compelling such employees to accept a demand by the employer in respect of a matter of mutual interest between the employer and the employees
  • however, a lockout is to be differentiated from a shut-out referred to by Zondo JP (as he then was) in Technikon SA v National Union of  Technikon Employees of SA (2001) 22 ILJ 427 (LAC), where, at paragraph [16] of the judgment, the court noted that an employer has the right at common law to refuse employees entry onto the workplace where the purpose of their coming onto the workplace is not to perform their duties – such an exclusion is not a lockout as defined in s213, as set out above, and is also not unlawful: it is simply the employer exercising its common law right
October 19, 2026

Section 41(2) of the BCEA regulates the entitlement of an employee, dismissed for reasons based on the employer’s operational requirements, to severance pay.

In terms of s41(4) of the BCEA, an employee, who unreasonably refused to accept the employer’s offer of alternative employment with that employer or any other employer, is not entitled to severance pay ito s41(2).

How does the assistance provided by the retrenching employer to a retrenched employee affect such employee’s entitlement to severance pay?

October 12, 2026

What is the short test to be applied to determine whether there is compliance with the reasonable decision-maker test?

When determining whether or not the arbitrator of the CCMA or bargaining council behaved like a reasonable decision-maker, what are the ‘questions to be asked’?

What is the test recently applied to determine whether an arbitration award should be set aside on review?

October 5, 2026

In the scenario where a group of employees, participating in a demonstration, picket, strike, etc, are participating in unlawful conduct, but a number of other employees, who are also participating in such demonstration, picket, strike, etc, are not participating in such unlawful conduct, will the employer be entitled to obtain an interdict against both groups of such employees?