{"id":20798,"date":"2026-05-18T09:16:10","date_gmt":"2026-05-18T09:16:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/korea\/20798\/"},"modified":"2026-05-18T09:16:10","modified_gmt":"2026-05-18T09:16:10","slug":"samsung-labor-management-split-on-normal-staffing-interpretation-amid-strike","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/korea\/20798\/","title":{"rendered":"Samsung Labor, Management Split on “Normal Staffing” Interpretation Amid Strike"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"SamsungSamsung Electronics labor and management hold final negotiations mediated by the government on the bonus dispute at the National Labor Relations Commission in the Sejong Government Complex on the 18th, three days before the planned general strike. Pictured from left are Yeo Myung-koo, head of the DS (semiconductor division) People Team and chief negotiator for Samsung Electronics; Park Soo-keun, chairman of the National Labor Relations Commission; and Choi Seung-ho, head of the Samsung Electronics branch of the Samsung Group Supra-Corporate Labor Union. Yonhap News<\/p>\n

Samsung Electronics (005930.KS) issued an official statement on the court’s injunction prohibiting illegal industrial action, saying that the “normal staffing” standard specified by the court for safety facility maintenance and security operations includes not only weekends and holidays but also weekdays. The company argued that the union’s interpretation, which holds that only weekend and holiday standards should apply, distorts the court’s ruling.<\/p>\n

On the 18th, the court ruled that under Article 38, Paragraph 2 of the Trade Union Act, security operations to prevent damage to work facilities and the deterioration or spoilage of raw materials and products must be carried out normally at usual levels even during industrial action periods. The court issued the same ruling for the maintenance and operation of safety protection facilities under Article 42, Paragraph 2 of the Trade Union Act. The court also ordered a ban on occupying major facilities, including production lines, research facilities, the Integrated Operations Center (IOC), procurement warehouses, electrical and computing facilities, and hazardous chemical storage facilities.<\/p>\n

Samsung Electronics filed for the injunction with the court on the 16th of last month to prevent illegal acts during the 18-day industrial action period that the union announced would begin on the 21st of this month.<\/p>\n

The disputed part of the ruling concerns the scale of “essential maintenance personnel.” The Samsung Electronics chapter of the Samsung Group Cho-Giup Labor Union, citing an opinion from law firm Majung, claimed that “normal staffing” refers to “weekend or holiday” personnel.<\/p>\n

Samsung Electronics, by contrast, pointed out that the phrase “normal” specified in the court’s ruling also includes “normal weekday” personnel. The company explained that weekday-level staffing must be deployed on weekdays during the strike period, and weekend and holiday-level staffing must be deployed on weekends and holidays. The company maintains that weekday staffing in the Device Solutions (DS) division should reach 7,000 people.<\/p>\n

“The 7,000 weekday personnel that Samsung Electronics is claiming includes the four-shift, three-rotation system and standby personnel,” an industry official said. “The union’s position is that excluding those personnel, members do not need to enter the production lines, which means the strike will not be neutralized.”<\/p>\n

Meanwhile, the National Labor Relations Commission (NLRC) is conducting arbitration of Samsung Electronics’ labor-management wage negotiations through a third post-mediation procedure on the 18th. NLRC Chairman Park Soo-keun told reporters during lunchtime that day, “We have only heard the basic positions (of both sides) so far,” adding, “(From the afternoon,) they will bring proposals.” The NLRC said the post-mediation meeting that day would continue until 7 p.m.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Samsung Electronics labor and management hold final negotiations mediated by the government on the bonus dispute at the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":20799,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[17],"tags":[14588,5381,14589,9102,14590,127,276,223,8749,508],"class_list":["post-20798","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-samsung","tag-court-injunction","tag-device-solutions","tag-industrial-action","tag-national-labor-relations-commission","tag-normal-staffing","tag-samsung","tag-samsung-electronics","tag-samsung-group","tag-samsung-labor-union","tag-wage-negotiations"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/korea\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20798","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/korea\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/korea\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/korea\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/korea\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=20798"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/korea\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20798\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/korea\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/20799"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/korea\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=20798"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/korea\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=20798"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/korea\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=20798"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}