Drastic changes to labour law released

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Drake2007

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Employers who contravene employment equity rules could be fined between 2% and 10% of their annual turnover.
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As expected, the draft labour relations amendment bill takes aim at the practice of labour broking. It aims to repeal Section 198 of the original act which allows the practice, estimated to give work to about half a million South Africans.
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http://www.moneyweb.co.za/mw/view/mw/en/page295043?oid=521373&sn=2009+Detail

Bye bye 500,000 jobs.
 
1.The bill clearly bans agencies from charging workers fees for placing them in jobs, stating "A private employment agency may only charge a fee to an employer".

2.To this end, the bill inserts a clause into the original act of 1995 stating that "an employee must be permanently employed, unless the employer can establish a justification for employment of a fixed term".

"The purpose of this clause is to prevent the use of 'fixed term' contract as a basis for depriving employees who are engaged for work of indefinite duration of security of employment," the bill's memorandum says.

It proposes that the clause should apply only to workers earning below a threshold to be proclaimed by the minister, thereby excluding managers and other senior staff on fixed contracts from the presumption.

3.The bill also takes aim at employers who pay workers performing "substantially the same work or work of equal value" different salaries, prohibiting this as unfair discrimination.
 
Sounds good to me. A bit non-free market, but what the hell. There can be a whole dollop of carefully crafted contracts, etc. minimizing exposure. The non-equity part is a bit funky though. It leaves room for unproductive people to be token appointments, and although this is already happening, it will get worse. Invest in some highly automated industrial equipment. Buy shares in Festo. And make sure you paint everything an off shade of brown.
 
I think its a long term plan,more people will be permanently employed at the end of the day...
 
These kind of laws is probably fine if you do not have a high unemployment rate, but it is not suitable for a country with a plus 25% unemployment rate.
 
Fining on turnover is just :wtf: Net would at least be more fair seeing as this kind of naive social engineering gets the popular vote and lets face it, the citizens wouldn't know the difference.

It's not like anyone is forcing people to use Labour Brokers to find work, but yes - the issue of who the actual employer is does need to be addressed.

I'm just wondering what's stopping large companies to have their holding company outside S.A. and creating divisions of 50 employee entities then the whole thing is circumvented?

This is going to deter foreign investment, but hey as long as the ANC is in power that's all they give a crap about.
 
Well it's not going to affect our company...There are 45 people in our section and only 3 of us are white, so we must be a shining light in the area! ;)
 
I agree with one or two of the amendments, especially those relating to labour brokers.

Too many companies have been hiding behind the labour brokers when sourcing staff as so-called "temporary" workers. When said temporary worker has been at the same company for over 2 or so years, said temporary worker should be offered a permanent position, especially if the function is still required at the company.

Companies like to abuse this relationship as it is much easier to terminate their services; you pick up the phone and tell the labour broker to remove the temporary worker for some or other stupid reason. Next day a "new" temporary worker reports for duty.

We need to be encouraging the growth of full time, permanent employees (where feasible and possible).

I totally disagree with the incorporation of penalties for AA targets in this law. This is already (and it should remain there) provided for the Employee Equity Act.
 
The laws are a response to the lack of change in the workplace and continued abuse of staff. I'm white so cannot complain about the non-BEE compliance but I have been screwed more often than not by previous employers and especially labour brokers.
 
I forgot to add that an employer will probably gain more in terms of productivity and efficiency from a full-time employee than a long term temporary worker.
 
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