creates difficulties for both employers and workers, with the latter experiencing periods of high income from overtime, followed by periods where they cannot meet their personal commitments owing to reduced wages after having been placed on short time. The agreement is linked to a separate agreement concerning rates of pay, production targets and production bonuses.Salient terms of this agreement are set out below: • Factory staff will, in future, be paid weekly wages for exactly 37,5 normal hours per week, regardless of the actual number of hours. • Tracksure may, by giving MINAMU 30 days written notice, “flex” the working hours to any number of hours between 30 and 45 normal hours per week, whilst continuing to pay all employees the fixed number of 37,5 hours per week. • Overtime will become payable to employees only when they are required to work more than the agreed “flexed” number of hours in a given week –Thus, where a week is agreed as a 30-hour week, an employee who works 44,5 hours will be paid for 37,5 hours normal time, plus 7 hours overtime. • Management expect that the actual hours worked will “balance out” over a two-year cycle and approximate an average of 37,5 hours per employee per week. − Where an employee works an average of more than 37,5 normal hours over a two-year cycle, any accumulated additional normal time worked over that period will be paid for by Tracksure at the end of the period. Employees who leave the employ of the company during this period would forfeit this benefit. − Tracksure carries the risk that employees might not reach the 37,5-hour average owing to reduced labour demand. Tracksure’s management regard 2019 as a “ramp-up” year inwhich the demand for labour was generally high with the result that employees spent much of the year working 45 hour working weeks (as well as working overtime) although being paid for only 37,5 hours per week. However, 2020 is projected to be a “run-out” year in the motor industry, complicated by reduced market demand, and management expect to implement a 30-hour working week as early as January 2020 because of a lower demand for new tracking units. This would confirm management’s expectation that the actual hours worked will “balance out” over a two-year cycle and approximate an average of 37,5 hours per employee per week.
