Industry Relations Consultant Noel Tofinga said quite often legislations and legislators forget the employer’s right to manage their own business.

He made this remarks while making his submission to the Standing Committee on Justice, Law and Human Rights on the Employment Relations (Amendment) Bill, 2015.

He made the presentation on the Bill with Fiji Commerce and Employers Federation chief executive officer Nesbitt Hazelman.

“Through globalisation, corporatisation and modernisation Fiji has joined the rest of the world in shifting from the old Industrial Relations (IR), the archaic laws designed to manage the IR Module was repelled and replaced by the Employment Relations Promulgation in 2007,”Mr Tofinga said.

He added that the Federation accepts the concept of having Arbitration Court but disagrees with what is said that the Arbitration Court cannot be challenged.

“We disagree totally with section 191BD for the simple reason that getting an opinion on an important question of law from the Sollicitor General’s office to aid the Arbitration Court determines an award (the very same award that cannot be prejudicial to any one of the disputing parties.

“It would be better or more prudent to seek an interpretation from the employment court.” Mr Hazelman said that in order to move forward, it is important to start afresh and to re-negotiate with good faith.

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