Sadtu general secretary Mugwena Maluleke said that while they were willing to negotiate with government to find a way out of the impasse, if they did not challenge the ruling, it would set a detrimental precedent for all wage negotiations.
In its responding papers to the Labour Court application made by the unions, Treasury said the workers who had been beneficiaries of decades of above-inflation salary increases should understand the exceptional circumstances in which government found itself.
Cosatu in KZN has staged a picket outside the offices of the provincial Treasury in Pietermaritzburg – among their demands is for vacant positions within the state to be filled.
EWN has established that only 4,600 people applied for the early retirement package, but it’s possible that only a portion of those applicants might ultimately qualify for the deal.
Finance Minister Tito Mboweni repeated the need for serious conversations to be had about the country’s soaring public sector wage bill.
The warning came from the Fiscal Cliff Study Group, which on Wednesday briefed Parliament’s two finance committees.
The trades union federation is among a string of organisations, lobby groups and economists making submissions on the Mid-Term Budget Policy Statement at Parliament.
Dlodlo says they need to reign in the R32 billion over-expenditure government has incurred on the wage bill over the past year.
While the president’s salary will increase to R3.9 million this year, his executive won’t be getting a cent more.
The Finance Minister has also pledged to fix the South African Revenue Collection Service as a matter of urgency.
