The ELRC is the bargaining council for public education and the body where conditions of employment and matters of mutual interest are negotiated for public educators.
Over the years, Prof Van der Walt and the Labour and Social Security Law Unit (LSSLU), an engagement entity, that he established in 2003, formed close ties with both the Department of Education, as employer and the different public education trade unions, such as SADTU, NAPTOSA, the SAOU, NATU and PEU.
The LSSLU presents the Practical Labour Law Programme (PLLP), a short learning programme. every semester in Gqeberha and East London, as well as on demand all over South Africa.
Some 20 years ago the first PLLP was presented to shop stewards and employer representatives in Public Education nationwide.
As the programme is also a bridging course and a qualification that contributes to recognition of prior learning, many of the public education and other students also qualified for the Postgraduate Diploma in Labour Law Practice, a curricular qualification introduced by Prof Van der Walt, following an MOU with the CCMA and bargaining councils in 2014 .
Hundreds of students have qualified with the qualification.
Some students qualified to be admitted to the LLM in Labour Law and two qualified with LLD degrees.
Prof Van der Walt has also established the Labour Law Advice office as part of the LSSLU, because of the dire need of unrepresented dismissed employees for legal representation.
As the Faculty of Law’s Law Clinic does not assist parties in labour law matters at all, the Labour Law Advice office accordingly had to step in to fill this significant gap in achieving social justice for the vulnerable.
Postgraduate associates and other paralegals assist with legal advice and representation at the CCMA and bargaining councils and Godsent Chabo, a doctoral student of Prof Van der Walt, manages the day-to-day operations of the Labour Law Advice Office.
Prof Van der Walt has also been the ministerially appointed chairperson of the Employment Conditions Commission for some 10 years, and more recently was the Chairperson of the National Minimum Wage Commission for five years until January 2024, when he did not make himself available for a second term.
Prof Van der Walt is a part-time senior commissioner of the CCMA. He has also been and still is the editor of Obiter, a peer reviewed and accredited law journal for some 20 years.