IN THE INDUSTRIAL COURT OF MALAYSIA BETWEEN KESATUAN KEBANGSAAN PEKERJA-PEKERJA PERDAGANGAN AND LF LOGISTICS SERVICES (M) SDN. BHD.

AWARD NO: 2405 OF 2023 Before : Y.A. TUAN AHMAD ZAKHI BIN MOHD DAUD Chairman MUHAMMAD HIDER BIN MD. YUSOFF Employees’ Panel ANANDARAJU A/L MOOKKAPILLAI Employers’ Panel Venue : Industrial Court, Kuala Lumpur.

Date of Reference : 14.10.2021 Dates of Mention : 16.12.2021, 30.08.2022, 14.09.2022 Dates of Hearing : 08.11.2022, 05.01.2023, 10.04.2023 Representation : Vickneswaran Palanisamy and Jerry Low Kok Kiang Messrs Josephine L K Chow & Co.

Counsels for the Union Suzanne Arockiaraj and Nor Amina Binti Azhar Messrs Alwin Rajasurya Counsels for the Company Reference This is a Ministerial reference made under section 26(2) of the Industrial Relations Act 1967 (“The Act”) dated 14.10.2021 arising out of the trade dispute between Kesatuan Kebangsaan Pekerja-Pekerja Perdagangan (“Union”) and LF Logistics Services (M) Sdn. Bhd. (“Company”).

AWARD [1] The Union filed their Written Submissions dated 03.03.2023. The Company filed their Written Submissions dated 09.03.2023. Subsequently the Company filed their Submissions In Reply dated 24.03.2023 and followed by Union’s Reply dated 29.03.2023. The parties have filed the Agreed Articles dated 18.10.2022.

[2] This court considered the notes of proceedings, documents and cause papers in handing down this Award namely:-

(i) Statement of Case dated 07.03.2022 (ii) Statement in Reply dated 15.04.2022 (iii) Rejoinder dated 26.05.2022 (iv) Union’s Bundle of Documents - UB-1, UB-2, UB-3 (v) Company’s Bundle of Documents - COB-1, COB-2 (vi) Union’s Witness Statement - UW1S (Rajeswaran A/L Muthusamy)

(vii) Company’s Witness Statement - COW1S (Chan Pek Yuen)

Background [3] The trade dispute before this court is in relation to the terms and conditions of employment to be incorporated into the new Collective Agreement between parties for the period of 01.01.2019 until

31.12.2021.

[4] The remaining articles in dispute to be heard and determined by this court are Article 9-Working Hours, Article 17(2)(d)(i)-Medical Attention, Article 32-Salary Structure and Article 42-Mode of Implementation.

Statement of Case [5] The Union prays that the court maintain the terms and conditions as proposed by the Union at pages 39 to 79 of UB-1.

Statement In Reply [6] The Company contended that the said terms and conditions in the current collective agreement are fair, reasonable and equitable terms and conditions of employment and in tandem with the performance of the Company and productivity of the employees.

The Union’s Case [7] The Union’s witness is Rajeswaran a/l Muthusamy (UW1) who is the Executive Secretary of the Union. UW1 produced his witness statement marked as UW1S. He testified among other thing that:

(i) He referred to the current Collective Agreement at pages 39 -

79 of UB-1. The 1^st column contains the existing terms and conditions and the 2^nd column contains the new proposals for the new Collective Agreement.

(ii) In respect of the Company trying to revise the working hours from 39 hours per week to 45 hours per week (Article 9) which the Union objects, it will put the employees in financial disadvantage as they will be asked to work extra hours without being paid overtime and cause interruptions to their scheduled daily family time and errands.

(iii) In respect of the request by the Union to increase the total liability of the Company for treatments in one calendar year (Article 17(2)(d)(i)), the Union is of the view that the current rate is inadequate in view of the ever-increasing costs of medical treatments and the employees want some peace of mind that their employer has reasonably covered them.

(iv) In respect of the request by the Union to revise the minimum salaries, maximum salaries and the annual increments rates (Article 32), the Union is only seeking to revise the minimum salaries to make it in accordance with the Minimum Wages Order 2020 (MWO) where it makes mandatory all emplo