Johannesburg - The University of Johannesburg, the National Education, Health and Allied Workers’ Union (Nehawu) and other workers’ representatives on Sunday signed an agreement on the insourcing of outsourced services and the transfer of workers to the university.
University management, Nehawu and other representatives of outsourced workers at the university met on Sunday, and having been briefed on the university’s intention to end all outsourcing arrangements at the earliest opportunity, agreed on a number of points, a joint statement said.
In terms of the memorandum of agreement, outsourced cleaning, protection, and gardening services would be insourced according to an agreed insourcing plan, and workers currently performing these services would be transferred through an agreed process to the university.
Parties would participate constructively in the university’s insourcing task team, whose task it was to urgently develop and agree on the insourcing plan, having considered all of the facts and remedial actions, including, but not limited to:
* Current contractual arrangements and obligations and how best to exit these;
* Minimum salaries and working conditions for affected workers;
* Change management programmes for workers to be insourced and current university employees in cleaning, protection, and gardening services that would arise from the planned insourcing;
* How the insourcing plan would be funded; and,
* Transitional arrangements.
In order for the task team’s work to be constructive, the university would in good faith provide all information essential for the team to complete its tasks.
The university’s protection services outsourcing contract would lapse soon, and the university would not enter into any new contract except on a month-by-month interim basis until the insourcing plan was finalised.
The work of the task team would be speeded up and completed by no later than the end of February next year.
The end-goal for the insourcing of services workers was to achieve decent work and a decent wage, and insourcing should result in a significant improvement in the standard of living of the workers concerned.
Outsourced services workers’ would return to work on Tuesday, subject to workers not participating in protest activity, not disrupting the normal operations of the university, and that all parties take collective leadership to achieve this.
The parties undertook to actively communicate the agreement to members, and the university council was fully behind the plan.
ANA
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