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Polity
Published: 19 Nov 2009
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| DA: Statement by Ian Ollis, Democratic Alliance Shadow Deputy Minister of Labour, on Labour brokers (19/11/2009) | |
| A parliamentary reply from the minister of police has revealed that his department spent R 336 million on labour brokers in the 2008/09 financial year, and that, in the minister's own words, they are used "to provide guard duties in instances where there are no sufficient permanent employees available to render services" and for non-core responsibilities like "cleaning services as well as some artisans services", which the minister says "allows for the SAPS to focus on its core functions by making trained police officials available for operational duties". This illustrates three points: First, labour brokers provide essential services to a police service that already faces a severe skills deficit. Banning them would be to place further burden on the Police. Indeed, the minister states in his reply that the use of labour broking allows "SAPS to focus on its core functions". There could be no harsher indictment of calls from the far left for labour broking to be banned than the fact that it will under-equip us in the fight against crime. Second, banning labour brokers would be to stop spending another R336 million on employing people. In other words, a government that is using the extended public works programme to eke out as many low paid jobs as possible, wants to go out of its way to prevent people from being employed. So far ministers from all government departments have revealed spending a total R 519 million on labour brokers for the 2008/09 financial year, which means that banning labour broking across the board would cut another R519 million worth of salaried positions. This leads on to the third point: we have seen countless hysterical claims from far left ministers like Blade Nzimande and Membathisi Mdladlana that labour broking is akin to slave labour. Well, if it indeed slave labour, then the ANC government is responsible for R519 million worth of slave labour last year. Either that, or all of the rhetoric and hot air has been nothing more than a thinly veiled attempt at boosting union membership figures, by banning the recipients of temporary employment who are less likely to be unionised. On top of all this, the minister states in his reply that "the department has taken a decision to discontinue the utilization of labour brokers". This in itself is cause for serious concern, for the very reasons that the minister outlined - labour brokers provide key services to the SAPS. By buckling under pressure from the far left, the minister will be diverting police away from their operational duties. My colleague Dianne Kohler Barnard will be submitting parliamentary questions to the minister of police on this matter at the next possible opportunity. MEDIA ENQUIRIES: Ian Ollis, MP - 082 714 7572 Ross van der Linde - 076 543 7254 TABULATED REPLY DATA FROM ALL DEPARTMENTS THAT EMPLOY LABOUR BROKERS: Department 2008/09 2007/08 2006/07 Police R 366,006,436 R 284,370,367 R 242,039,280 Justice and Constitutional Development R 89,329,692 R 61,104,652 R 34,962,772 Water and Environmental Affairs R 18,797,120 R 13,569,619 R 9,211,033 National Treasury R 11,715,154 R 9,649,543 R 7,441,360 Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries R 10,575,000 R 10,572,000 R 6,528,000 Rural Development and Land Reform R 9,152,000 R 12,162,945 R 1,592,826 Public Service and Administration R 8,295,104 R 7,355,916 R 6,624,050 Social Development R 1,765,231 R 1,265,411 R 656,910 Human Settlements R 1,203,420 R 757,855 R 131,855 Health R 1,062,444 R 267,327 R 323,755 Communication R 636,357 R 1,011,065 R 458,977 Public Enterprises R 494,311 R 576,451 R 89,527 Transport R 419,752 R 403,026 R 64,608 Public Works R 120,000 R 1,584,000 R 0 Total R 519,572,021 R 404,650,177 R 310,124,953 PARLIAMENTARY REPLY: FOR WRITTEN REPLY QUESTION NO 1158 DATE OF PUBLICATION IN INTERNAL QUESTION PAPER: 11 SEPTEMBER 2009 (INTERNAL QUESTION PAPER NO 16 - 2009) Date reply submitted : 16 November 2009 Mr T W Coetzee (DA) to ask the Minister of Police: Whether the SA Police Service uses temporary employment services and/or labour brokers; if so, (a) why, (b) how many positions have been filled by temporary employment services in the (I) 2006-07, (ii) 2007-08 and (iii) 2008-09 financial years, (c) what percentage of the total staff complement did temporary employment services contribute in each of these years and (d) how much money has been spent on temporary employment services in each year? NW1493E REPLY: Yes. The South African Police Service is making use of temporary employment services in terms of which individual persons are employed on a temporary basis and individually compensated directly by the South African Police Service. The Service is also making use of the services of labour brokers. (a) Temporary employees are mainly appointed to provide guard duties in instances where there are no sufficient permanent employees available to render services as guards at hospitals to guard awaiting trial prisoners as well as the guarding of patients at mental institutions. In instances where the services of such temporary employees were utilized for a prolonged period, they were permanently employed by the Service. The non-core functions like security, cleaning services as well as some artisans services are outsourced to labour brokers who are contractually bound to provide such services. The temporary employment of eg. security services allows for the SAPS to focus on its core functions by making trained police officials available for operational duties. It is important to note that the department has taken a decision to discontinue the utilization of labour brokers. The options and / or modalities of ensuring capacity to perform related functions within the department are being explored. The existing contracts will be phased out in accordance with the contractual obligations. (b)(c) and (d) The information required in (b)(i)-(iii), (c) and (d) is presented as follows: Temporary employees (although information is presented in columns (b) and (c) below, it has to be mentioned that temporary employees are employed as and when required). Financial year (b) Positions filled (c) % of total staff complement (d) Money spent (i) 2006-07 2672 1,63% R40,543,717 (ii) 2007-08 1493 0,86% R30,817,329 (iii) 2008-09 1284 ,70% R26,676,935 Labour brokers Financial year (b) Positions filled (c) % of total staff complement (d) Money spent (i) 2006-07 No positions have been filled by temporary employment services / labour brokers as these services are used as and when required on a contract basis The contribution of the temporary employment services/labour brokers cannot be expressed as a percentage of the total staff complement because these temporary employment services/labour brokers do not form part of SAPS staff complement R201,495,563 (ii) 2007-08 R253,553,038 (iii) 2008-09 R339,329,501 Reply to question 1158 approved by Minister |
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