Four+Union+Joint+Press+Release+on+Transnet+Dispute

=**Joint Press Release on Transnet Dispute**=

Issued by Satawu, Utatu, Sarwhu and Uasa
The four trade unions that are in dispute with Transnet over its restructuring plans are disappointed that Transnet management has made no efforts to resolve the dispute since the conciliator appointed to mediate the dispute issued a certificate of non resolution in late November last year. The certificate allows the unions to give 48 hours notice of strike action. The four unions - Satawu, Utatu, Sarwhu and Uasa - have therefore stepped up the consultation process with their members and each other with a view to developing a joint plan of action. Joint meetings of members will be held in every Transnet workplace over the coming week. The four unions jointly represent all grades of workers within Transnet including some managerial staff. Membership covered by the dispute straddle Metrorail, Spoornet, SAA, SA Port Operations, National Port Authority, Petronet, Transwerk, Autopax, Freightdynamics, and a number of smaller business units. The total workforce of Transnet is in the region of 85,000. The dispute is about the process of negotiation. Management is flagrantly ignoring procedures. It is keeping some significant restructuring issues such as the transfer of 9,000 Metrorail workers out of Transnet, out of the forums set up to deal with restructuring. It is also putting sales agreements in place ahead of the mutual securing of jobs and employment conditions. It is deliberately trying to fragment the process of restructuring so that the unions are not coherently involved in the determining the bigger picture. The trade unions are simply seen as an obstacle and workers as pawns in a process. This refusal to see the trade unions and their members as partners and a resource, will come back to haunt Transnet in the future. The public should take note that the company whose CEO won the Business Person of the Year award last year has a Human Resources department that is in tatters. The unions are of the view that the absence of an Executive Manager in charge of human resources (including negotiations with trade unions) for the past eighteen months, and the transfer of many human resource functions to an overpaid consultancy, have contributed to the current impasse. It is rumoured that the consultancy Resolve is on a R20m contract with Transnet. It can be no accident that the independent professional appointed by management to act on its behalf as co-chairperson of the Transnet Restructuring Committee, withdrew from his appointment at the end of last year. The improved financial results of Transnet will be unsustainable if the Group does not get its Human Resources house in order. SATAWU : Johnson Gamede (0832544812) or Jane Barrett (0828278561) UTATU :   Steve Harris (0825665516) or Chris de Vos (0828825920) SARWHU : Shadrack Ntuli (0833769363) UASA:      Gerhard Ueckerman 011 472 3600 (ext 178)**
 * 17th January 2006**
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