Tag: Bradley Workman-Davies

The Labour Appeal Court decision in Backsports (Pty) Ltd vs Motlhanke and another offers a useful reminder. Dismissal does not mark the end of an employer’s rights. This remains true where a restraint of trade was carefully agreed and clearly breached. For employers, the judgment reinforces several important lessons about enforcement, evidence and the limits of sympathy-based reasoning. In other words, it offers clarity in disputes that often resemble the fired and the furious, where emotions run high after termination.

When you run your work as a business, invoice for your services, and elect to skip the obligations that come with being an employee, you cannot turn around and claim employee protection when the relationship ends. 

In the recent case of SMD Technologies (Pty) Ltd v Tavares and Another ([2024] ZALCJHB 546), the Labour Court upheld the enforceability of restraint of trade agreements in South African employment law. The court emphasised that these restraints must be reasonable and must protect legitimate business interests.

The rapid integration and adoption of Artificial Intelligence (AI) across various industries and sectors is transforming the way businesses operate. It is driving efficiency, innovation and cost savings with its prolific progress. AI is reshaping the workplace at an unprecedented pace. It is streamlining administrative tasks and optimising complex processes.

In many cases when employers hire executive level, management or key employees, there is a recognition that these hires can impact the success of the business, due to the individual's recognition in their industry, or knowledge and experience, or client and customer relationships, or a combination of all of these qualities.

Labour relations and the fairness standards for dismissal of an employee in South Africa have long been centred around the formality of disciplinary or incapacity enquiry processes, and the tradition of the usage of these processes has built up an expectation that they are mandatory.  

A common occurrence in the employment relationship is for an employee to resign in the face of disciplinary action by an employer, and South African courts have previously accepted that as long as an employee resigns with immediate effect, the employer has no power to compel the former employer to go through any disciplinary process.  

A recent bill submitted to Parliament for consideration would seek to impose potentially stringent new quotas for numerical targets for the employment of persons from designated groups. 

An interview with Jacques van Wyk, Director, Werksmans Attorneys, and Dr Ivor Blumenthal, CEO, ArkKonsult, discussing an article penned by Bradley Workman-Davies, Director, Werksmans Attorneys, in the August/September edition of BusinessBrief, apropos an important recent judgement in the Johannesburg High Court which has provided some clarity with regard to no-work no-pay during the lockdown.

The Compensation Commissioner published, by way of Government Gazette, a ‘Notice on Compensation for Occupational-Acquired Novel Corona Virus Diseases (COVID-19). The Notice came into effect on 23 March 2020. In order to qualify, the occupational acquired COVID-19 disease (OACD) must have been contracted by an employee in the course of his or her employment.