custom and practice

custom and practice

a way of doing things that receives its justification from the claim that ‘things have always been done like this’ rather than from any specific rule. In INDUSTRIAL RELATIONS it generally refers to working practices which are operated by workforces and TRADE UNIONS and which are implicitly condoned by management, but have not been explicitly sanctioned in a formal agreement. The buying-out of such practices is often the subject of productivity initiatives tabled by managements during COLLECTIVE BARGAINING. See RESTRICTIVE LABOUR PRACTICE.