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The South African Chamber of Commerce and Industry (SACCI) today presented on the amendment bills to the Basic Conditions of Employment Act (BCEA) and the Labour Relations Act (LRA) to the Parliamentary Portfolio Committee on Labour.

It is of the utmost importance that the South African labour regulations, along with the rest of the regulatory sphere, facilitate job creation and economic growth.
Unfortunately, some of the proposed amendments to the BCEA and the LRA do exactly the opposite by imposing further costs on business to employ workers and increasing the rigidity in market for temporary employment services.

In general, the problematic provisions in the proposed amendments increase the level of uncertainty in the labour market and serves as a disincentive to employ a larger workforce.

Some of the points of concern to SACCI include the arbitrary limit of 6 months to temporary employment contracts, equal treatment of temporary and permanent workers after the 6 month term, the extension of picketing rights to unrelated third parties, the default requirement that an employer post the equivalent of 24 months of salary in an application for a review of arbitration, the provision that temporary workers may able to sue for unfair dismissal due to an expectation of contract renewal or permanent employment.

In addition, substantial increases in the powers of the minister both in allowing the minister to determine increases on actual rates of pay in Sectoral Determinations as well in empowering the Minister to prohibit or regulate the use of sub-contracting, labour brokering and outsourcing are equally concerning.

SACCI calls upon parliament in the spirit of cooperation to request the DoL to address the problematic amendments in order to achieve greater certainty for the business community and to reduce the unnecessary costs to business that the amendments would otherwise introduce.