In this country furlough means lay-off

THE EDITOR: The latest round of job losses in Finance Minister Colm Imbert’s “booming” economy is the sending home of 100 workers at Caridoc, a state-owned enterprise, for an indefinite period. The workers were told that they were furloughed.

What is furlough, you may ask. All of a sudden during covid19 we started to hear about furlough. Originally it was an American military term for soldiers who are granted leave for a specified time.

The word seemed to have wound its way into the American industrial relations lexicon and in that jurisdiction it is defined as temporary cessations of work characterised by employees retaining their jobs but not getting paid.

Employees keep their benefits during furloughs and anticipate that they will return to work within a certain period of time. In our industrial relations lexicon that is lay-off.

In the UK, furlough, which also was not part of their industrial relations language, became all the rage when employers tried to deal with covid19. They adopted the American definition, except that their furloughed workers were paid: in some instances 80 per cent of their wage and in others 60 per cent.

There is no such thing as furlough in our industrial relations lexicon. What we do have is lay-off, which lasts for a definite period of time.

In the past the Industrial Court has opined that a reasonable lay-off period is three months. How the court may reason in the future is open to speculation. Maybe we may get a clue if the word furlough begins appearing in its judgments.

GERRY KANGALEE

Rambert Village