Certifying, Appealing and Modifying Standing Orders

In one line

The employer drafts standing orders from the Government's model, consults the union, and sends them to a certifying officer who tests them for fairness, certifies them, and sends copies out; either side may appeal within sixty days; the orders then come into operation and cannot be changed for six months.

In exam wording: under section 30 of the Industrial Relations Code 2020 the employer prepares draft standing orders within six months of the commencement of the Code, based on the model standing orders and covering every matter in the First Schedule, consults the Trade Unions or the negotiating union or council, and forwards the draft to the certifying officer, who issues notice for comments, gives an opportunity of being heard, adjudicates upon the fairness or reasonableness of the provisions, and certifies within sixty days failing which the draft is deemed certified; section 32 gives an appeal within sixty days to the appellate authority; section 33 fixes the date of operation at thirty days from the sending of authenticated copies or seven days from an appellate order; section 35 bars modification for six months except by agreement; section 36 excludes oral evidence contradicting certified standing orders; section 37 sends questions of application or interpretation to the Tribunal; and section 38 limits disciplinary proceedings to ninety days and fixes subsistence allowance.

Why the law has this at all

The last chapter established that an employer of three hundred workers must have written rules. This one is about the thing that makes the requirement worth anything: somebody independent checks them.

A rule that the employer writes for himself is not a protection. If the whole obligation were "write down your conditions of service", an employer could write that misconduct includes anything the manager disapproves of, that leave is granted entirely at discretion, and that employment may be terminated without notice. He would have complied. The worker would be exactly where he was.

So the Chapter does four things in sequence, and the sequence is the answer to any question on this topic.

It supplies a floor. The employer drafts from the model standing orders, not from nothing.

It brings the workers in before certification. The employer must consult the union, and the certifying officer must invite comments and give an opportunity of being heard.

It gives the officer a substantive power. Section 30(7) makes it his function to adjudicate on fairness or reasonableness, not merely to check that the boxes are filled.

And it then makes the result stick. Once certified, the orders bind, oral evidence cannot contradict them, questions about them go to the Tribunal, and they cannot be reopened for six months.