Employment Security of Probationary Workers in Sri Lanka: A Comparative Legal Analysis

Abstract

Employment security is one of the most important factors which help to create an efficientandasatisfactoryworking environment. Probationary employment is one of the challenging employment types which indicates uncertain nature of job status in the labour relations. Although, the main objective of the probationary period is to assess the employee’s suitability for the continuation of employment, some employers misuse probation employment by terminating probationers in mala fide. The underlying question is whether the employer has sole discretion to terminate a probationary employee without assessing him adequately or without giving proper reasons. In the Sri Lankan context, there is no proper legislative guidance to regulate probationary employment and therefore, a series of cases provide different interpretations with regard to the employer’s discretion on deciding whether the employee’s conduct is satisfactory or not. In contrast, the South African legal framework envisages clear statutory measures to safeguard the employment security of the probationary employees against the malafide acts of employers. The South African Labour Relations Act in 1995 contains specific provisions in relating to the duration of probationary period and dismissal of probationary employees. Therefore, this research aims to analyse the Sri LankanandSouthAfricanjurisdictions comparativelyandsuggestpossible recommendations forSriLankanlaw with regardtothe employment security of the probationary employees. Qualitative research method has been utilized to achieve the aforementionedresearchobjective.