Court stops cabin crew strike

The Labour Court yesterday confirmed as final the interim order it made last week prohibiting members of the SA Cabin Crew Association from striking.

Acting Judge Sean Snyman made the order final after listening to arguments from the association, which opposed the prohibition, and SA Airways.

Snyman said he would give his reasons for the finalisation on May10. There was no order as to costs. The association's members embarked on a strike last week in a dispute about international meal allowances for SAA cabin crew .

The airline has not increased the allowance since 2011.

Cabin crew currently get a $131 (about R1,770) international meal allowance but are demanding that SAA raise it to $170 a day.

The strike resulted in the cancellation of more than 30 flights at airports across the country.

SAA incurred losses amounting to R25-million as a result of the cancellations.

The airline applied to the Labour Court on the day the strike began and obtained an interim order restraining the association's members from striking.

SAA lawyer Andrew Redding argued yesterday that the interim interdict should be made final because the employees had not complied with the requirements of the Labour Relations Act for classing a strike as "protected".

He said meal allowances were an operational cost and workers could not strike in pursuing a dispute that did not involve terms of employment.

The lawyer for the Cabin Crew Association, Omphemetse Mooki, said the association had referred the dispute to the Commission for Conciliation, Mediation and Arbitration (CCMA) in February .

Mooki said the commission certified that the labour dispute was unresolved.

He said the association's members were entitled to strike because they had satisfied all the requirements of the Labour Relations Act.

Mooki said the act stated that every employee had a right to strike if the issue in dispute had been referred to a bargaining council or to the CCMA, and if a certificate stating that the issue was unresolved had been issued.