Retrenched Sun journalists receive settlement dues
Two cases of industrial disputes brought against The Sun management by five journalists who were unceremoniously retrenched early this year were settled out-of-court today when the company decided to pay them their claims.
According to National Union of Journalists (NUJ) Sun branch secretary P Vijian, who is also a party to the claims, the newspaper offered to give the journalists their due two-month contractual bonus for last year and the annual salary increment they claimed.
"They decided to settle both cases. We were given the checks for the two-months' bonus. They also agreed to pay us the annual increment," Vijian told malaysiakini today.
He said the checks for the contractual bonus were given out to the four journalists today. The fifth is expected to receive his check soon.
Meanwhile, the payment for annual increment will be made after the company calculated the sum for each of the journalists involved, Vijian added.
The Sun 's human resource manager N Shanmugaratinam was unavailable for comment.
The journalists brought several cases to the Industrial Court against their former employer for breach of collective agreement. Under Section 56 of the Industrial Relations Act, a company must comply with the collective agreement signed between the management and the union.
Breached agreement
The journalists argued that their former employer had breached the collective agreement when it refused to give them their annual salary increment and two-months contractual bonuses last year.
Today is supposed to be the hearing for the dispute on the claims for annual increment, while the hearing for claims on the bonuses was scheduled in September.
In January this year, The Sun retrenched 53 employees citing financial difficulties. However, the sacked staff claimed that union members were deliberately targetted.
One month later, the company terminated another 256 of its remaining 411 staff after it was announced that another media company was interested to buy a substantial stake in the company.
The paper, with a circulation of about 82,000, suffered an estimated loss of RM200 million since its inception in 1993.
Since the mass retrenchment exercise, the company has brought in a new management team and business model.
The Sun , an English daily, is now distributed free to the public.
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