'Mother of all battles in 2011' - Cosatu

Draft amendments to labour-related Acts, which could see the banning of labour broking, are set to cost SA millions of jobs, says the DA.

However, Congress of SA Trade Unions (Cosatu) has endorsed the amendments, saying labour broking is a new form of slavery and needs to be banned completely.

The Democratic Alliance (DA) says the amendments pander to interest groups that are only interested in protecting their members, and have no concern for the plight of the majority of South Africans.

It adds that the state has a responsibility to protect workers' rights, but not at the plight of the majority of citizens.

Draft amendments to the Labour Relations Act (LRA), Basic Conditions of Employment Act and Employment Equity Act, and a new piece of proposed legislation - the Public Employment Services Bill - were published in the government gazette in December.

A proposed amendment is to regulate contract work, with the aim to stop the practice of repeated contracting for short-term periods.

New definitions of employer and employee have also been introduced to give greater certainty to the employment relationship, according to labour minister Nelisiwe Mildred Oliphant.

“As a result of the new definition of employer, no temporary employment service will be able to be the employer of workers that it places in work.”

She adds that the Labour Relations Amendment Bill proposes to repeal section 198 that deals with temporary employment services in the Labour Relations Act (no 66 of 1995).

“Already, there are different positions among the social partners on the issue of labour broking. The proposed deletion of section 198 of the Labour Relations Act is a contested area.”

Oliphant says all four Bills were subjected to a regulatory impact assessment (RIA) during July and August.

DA shadow minister of labour Ian Ollis says the party is particularly concerned with the attempt to amend the LRA, which would force employees to be employed permanently “unless the employer can establish a justification for employment on a fixed term”.

He says this measure would effectively ban labour brokers by stealth, and therefore places as many as one million jobs in SA's economy in jeopardy.

“It is the single most serious legislative assault on SA's economic development that we have witnessed under the Zuma administration; in its present form, it simply cannot be passed by Parliament in good conscience,” says Ollis.

Despite previous denials by the Department of Labour (DOL) that labour broking would be banned as per the new Bills, it now says banning the industry is a possibility.

The department says labour broking “and the abuse of workers associated with the practice” may soon be a thing of the past if Oliphant has her way.

“The amendments have their origins in the growing 'casualisation' of work that has become a feature of the South African labour market over the past decade.”

Ollis says the draft Bills require detailed examination in terms of their effects on SA's economy and urgent input from the public, which need to be submitted by 17 February.

“We have already identified several areas of these draft Bills that we are concerned have been poorly formulated, or that could be harmful to our economy. In certain limited respects, we also recognise certain improvements in the gazetted drafts, from those that were leaked to the press earlier in the year.

“However, they remain far from acceptable and, if implemented, would cost SA jobs.”

However, Cosatu says parallel to the loss of jobs in SA is a continuing shift from permanent to temporary employment.

“The latest report of the Adcorp Employment Index reveals that, while jobs overall had declined by an annualised 2.41% by November 2010, the number of permanent workers decreased most, by 2.74%, while the number of temporary workers decreased by only 1.6%. Meanwhile, the number of 'agency' workers (those employed by labour brokers) increased by 5.59%.”

The congress says this survey shows there are nearly 100 000 more labour broker workers than previously estimated. They now represent 6.8% of total employment in SA and 23.2% of the country's temporary and part-time workforce.

“This is having a devastating negative effect on the levels of pay, job security and benefits for thousands of workers.”

Cosatu welcomes the draft amendments. “We are studying all of them to satisfy ourselves that they deliver only one outcome: doing away with the third man in the relationship that should exist between a worker and the employer.

“We want a total ban of the system that has condemned so many to new slavery by what has become to be known as human traffickers.”

The congress says it is ready to mobilise all genuine workers' organisations and the poor in defence of the decent work agenda, which cannot live side-by-side with labour broking.

“We call on workers to use their rest to re-energise themselves and be ready for a mother of all battles in 2011.”

Labour broking still has a role in SA and banning the practice would deal a blow to the jobless, said the Unemployed People's Party (UPP), according to media reports.

"If Cosatu were to prepare for a 'mother of all battles in 2011', then the unemployed would have to prepare for the 'father of all battles' in response," said UPP general secretary Malcolm Gema.

He encouraged alternatives to a ban, like greater regulation of the industry.