"Reflections on a decade of skills development and preparing for the future."

Programme director
Honourable members of Parliament
Leaders of the organised trade union movement, organised business, organised community organisations, organised providers
Government officials
Members of the National Skills Authority, Sector Education and Training Authorities (SETAs), Productivity South Africa, Umsobomvu Youth Fund Boards and your staff
Representatives of the various donor communities
Members of the media
Ladies and gentleman

Good afternoon

Reflections on the last ten years
Lest we forget, as we "reflect on the decade of skills development and prepare for the future" in 1994, we inherited a disintegrated labour market dispensation and policies that were applicable in the former Republics of Transkei, Bophuthatswana, Venda and Ciskei (TBVC states), other sets of laws that were applicable in the self governing territories or homelands such as Gazankulu, KwaZulu-Natal, KaNgwane etc, and those that were applicable in white South Africa's former four provinces under the nationalist government. We inherited a labour market that segregated, very low skills levels and ill prepared because of the system of Bantu education, very adversarial and not properly organised.

In transforming the labour market landscape, we were guided amongst others by the Freedom Charter adopted at the Congress of the People in Kliptown on 26 June 1955. The Freedom Charter declared for all our country and the world to know, "That the doors of learning and culture shall be opened. Higher education and technical training shall be opened to all by means of state allowances and scholarships awarded on the basis of merit." The Freedom Charter also declared that "the people shall share in the country's wealth. All people shall have equal rights to trade where they choose, to manufacture and to enter all trades, crafts and professions." We were also guided by the Constitution of our country (Act 108 of 1996) as it has further embraced these ideals in Chapter 2, Section 22 by stating that: "Every citizen has the right to choose their trade, occupation or profession freely. The practice of a trade, occupation or profession may be regulated by law."

As part the Department of Labour's (DoL) contribution to the ideals contained in the Freedom Charter, the Bill of Rights and the Manifesto of the African National Congress (ANC), we initiated a process that resulted in the integration of these myriad of laws and in their place formulated solid policies that we have to this day. Amongst our interventions aimed at assisting the people of South Africa to realise their aspirations and dreams, and in our quest to eradicate poverty and to contribute to employment creation, a decade ago we spearheaded a process that culminated in Parliament passing amongst others The Skills Development Act 1998 and the Skills Development Levies Act of 1999.

Through these legal instruments we were able to set up institutions, systems and processes, regulations etc, that assisted us to develop career-paths, new occupations and trade qualifications that are in line with those of the international communities. They assisted us to develop the skills of millions of South Africans. Through our integrated labour market interventions that include our skills development, our health and safety campaigns, our labour standards enforcement, promotion of social dialogue amongst labour market stakeholders, we have succeeded in maintaining stability in the labour market, thereby contributing to the current growth of the economy of our country. Most importantly we have saved jobs and assisted in the creation of new ones. We have facilitated the entrance to the labour market amongst the youth, women, and people with disabilities. We have contributed to the realisation of major developmental projects through the length and breadth of our country. Whilst we worked very hard, we have not been amongst the best when it comes to blowing our Vuvuzela for every little achievement we have made. A lot has been done and a lot still need to be done.

1. Some of you may be asking questions like, where is the evidence to substantiate all what he is saying? I am saying all this with confidence because, apart from reliance on our internal monitoring and evaluation system on the impact of our policies. We have opened ourselves up to independent scrutiny as we are confident with our work. Not only confident but also very proud of our achievements. We have engaged the services of external parties every third year and have also invited our social partners to provide us with their own assessment. The media, has also depending on their criteria, given us their own preferred ratings. We have during the last two years, also commissioned the Human Science Research Council (HSRC) together with their other research partners such as the SWOP and the Development Policy Research Unit (DPRU) to independently assess impact of our policies. The HSRC has produced no less than 45 reports, covering various topics and presented us with evidence on some of the issues I have mentioned. They have also criticised us in those areas that we fell short, pointed out those areas that we can still improve upon and also made a series of recommendations. We just had the first seminar series on skills development only last Friday at Kopanong and we will be having the second one at the Birchwood Hotel on 31 October 2008 as from 12h30. Other seminar series are planned for November 2008 and my officials will be making those reports available.

Tributes
I want to thank the African National Congress for having given me the opportunity to continue to serve in this portfolio for more than a decade. This opportunity allowed me, to be associated and to engage with those who are keen to acknowledge that there is a problem of scarce and critical skills that we continue to face as a country. The ANC has given me the opportunity to engage and find common solutions with those that are willing to acknowledge that the country had past practices that were unjust and wrong and are determined to correct them. An opportunity to work with those who were willing to assist us in formulating joint strategies and intervention measures to provide good quality education and skills development to correct the existing inequalities. I want to thank them for affording me an opportunity to be associated with people who were willing and prepared to transcend beyond the tradition. An opportunity to work very closely with all social partners in the labour market to ensure that our skills development programmes are responsive and relevant to our social and economic demands whilst at the same time fulfilling individual needs and aspirations. That is what I enjoyed during the last ten years of my time in the Department of Labour and again I want to thank them for having given me the space and platform to work with all of you.

1. I also want to take this opportunity, to thank every single one of you for having been good company during the last decade. I want to thank those colleagues that served in the last three Boards of the National Skills Authority terms, the boards and councils of the various Sector Education and Training Authorities (SETAs), National Economic Development and Labour Council (NEDLAC), Productivity South Africa, Umsobomvu Youth Fund etc. We will tomorrow honour like we did over the years, those organisations that did us proud during the 2007/08 financial year. The road that we travelled together during the last ten years was not an easy one. Sometimes the weather was bad, the slopes were very steep, we had to fight and put some SETAs under administration, we had to get other people arrested for letting their fingers do the walking in the tills, we had media spat, we made peace and we soldiered on. We achieved as a country, as stated in the Fifteen Years Review released by the Presidency, things that well established democracies struggled to achieve in 100 years. Some democracies towards the north of our country are still struggling even today to achieve some of those things, despite having secured their independence years before us. South Africans would have wanted us to achieve more than what we did. It is precisely for this reason that I want to thank you on behalf of the Department of Labour. We would not have achieved all these during the last ten years without your co-operation, commitment and contribution. You all deserve applause.

Challenges
Despite all these achievements, it will be wrong for us to rest on our laurels. I am the first to admit that ten years in our case may have been very little to begin to make a dent in addressing serious skills disparities that continue to exist and to equip our people with skills that will enable them to participate effectively in the socio and economic mainstream of our country. We are still sitting on a youth unemployment time bomb that can explode anytime unless we provide access to learning, livelihood and employment opportunities. Of concern, is the plight of the large numbers of young people graduating or dropping out of the general schooling system, the Further Education and Training (FET) institutions and higher education and continue to join the labour market that they were never prepared for, an area that is beyond their imagination, an environment that operates on completely different rules.

Almost on a daily basis, there is a media outcry regarding the "brain drain and skills shortage" whilst at the same time, we continue to be told about the little progress that has been made in creating jobs, others continue to capitalise on statistics regarding the large number of young and adult unemployed South Africans.

During last year's National Skills Conference, we also reflected extensively on some of the systemic problems and proposed various solutions. I am happy to note that there were certain aspects and recommendations that were followed through to the end. Key amongst them were recommendations that we processed through the Skills Development Amendment Bill 2008 currently before parliament. The Bill amongst others, deals with the establishment of the Quality Council for trades and occupations, the accelerated delivery of artisans and integration of routes etc. To this end, I am expecting my officials and the National Skills Authority, to develop extensive implementation plans to enable us to move with speed as soon as the Bill is passed. There were other projects that are still outstanding such as the relevance and appropriateness of the current institutional framework that must still be concluded before the current Sector Education and Training Authority (SETA) landscape and National Skills Development Strategy (NSDS) 2005 to 2010 timeframes expires.

Preparing for the future

Programme director, It is my sincere belief that we can still do more to get thousands of young unemployed people into employment to support and sustain current economic growth trends, the broader Accelerated and Shared Growth-South Africa (ASGI-SA) projects and to contribute to the future maintenance of the massive infrastructure that is being developed. We can still do more to get our people out of the poverty circle, we can still do more to improve the living standard of our people and we can still do more to make South Africa a better country within which to live and to invest.

As we prepare for the future, I will be watching with keen interest on Friday, the reports of the various commissions and the constituency views on the identified sub-themes.

On deepening coherence and integration in skills development delivery, the commission may also want to reflect on some of the following aspects.
* When Joint Initiative on Priority Skills Acquisition (JIPSA) was launched, there were some reservations in other quarters whilst others were not sure as to how it was to relate to other various statutory bodies working in this area that were already in existence. Some posed questions as to whether the National Skills Authority really exist and what has been its role, given the current skills crisis.
* There is a proposal on the New Human Resource Development Strategy developed in government and currently being discussed at NEDLAC. Our National Skills Development Strategy and its associated Workplace skills plans and sector skills plans will become a component of this strategy. Besides this, the various sectors and government departments, continue to develop their sector or Human Resource Development (HRD) strategies that are sometimes not linked at all to these national initiatives.
* Last year, we had proposals on the National Industrial Strategy and its implementation plan that we need to align our skills development strategies and interventions to. These include the SETA landscape repositioning to support these industrial strategies.
* There are calls for integrated planning in order to ensure alignment and to maximise government impact.

Without repeating the numbers of people that have already benefited from our interventions and the numbers of young people that continue to enter the labour market ill prepared, there continues a feeling that suggest that we are not doing enough given the resources at our disposal. This include:
* Whether the current delivery system and mechanism is sufficiently established to assist us to deliver on the magnitude and the scale that is expected out of us. Some people have posed questions regarding the inappropriateness of the higher education measures with Technikons and Technical Colleges into FETs.
* The private provider landscape that we rely on is it affordable and likely to be accessible in the long term or what can be done to maximise private partnerships without compromising on quality and National Qualifications Framework (NQF) alignment.
* Are our systems for future skills identification process tight and well developed enough to develop people beyond 2010 and to meet global technological and competitiveness challenges. Has the schooling system bought into this process and if not how best can we insure that it happens.

The Quality Council for Trades and Occupations (QCTO) will soon become a reality, the questions I would want the commission to also reflect upon include amongst other:
* Whether the plans that are being put in place will have the desired impact.
* Prof Mehl, in his report make specific recommendations regarding capacitating all SETA senior managers and ensuring that we continue to draw labour market experts to realise some of the objectives. Do we agree with his proposals and what are we doing about them.
* The new National Qualifications Framework will also soon be signed into law. How do we gear ourselves such that we continue to develop qualifications that are relevant and responsive to the labour market needs with sufficient articulation with other forms of institutional learning and the workplaces.
* How do we continue to implement the resolution of the ANC in "Ready to Govern." The ANC committed itself to "the establishment of a nationally integrated system of education and training. All sector specific training, including training for the public sector, welfare and sports will take place within the national framework to ensure that skills acquired are nationally recognised, portable and contribute to career pathing."

Last but not least, our National Skills Development Strategy (NSDS) has a five year life span, and as per our established tradition, We have tended to plan long before the implementation date, so that we can have a framework within which we can as a collective, adopt a line of march. We may want to reflect on:
* What has worked and has been successful in the two strategies that we have had so far that we need to retain going into the period 2010 to 2015.
* What are other new elements that must be brought in including the appropriate objectives and applicable targets.
* We may also need to reflect on the National Human Resource Development (NHRD), JIPSA etc developments and pose a question as to whether we still need an NSDS at all.

Finally, I want to extend my word of appreciation to the National Skills Authority for having worked tirelessly to structure the Conference programme in the manner that they did. I wish you all the best in your commissions and hope that the three days that we are going to spend together will take us a step further in changing the phase of our skills development interventions in the country.

I thank you.