In our afternoon roundup, see summaries
of our selection of South African labour-
related stories that appeared thus far on
Thursday, 7 December 2017.
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New Northern Cape mining health service centre 'an early Christmas gift' News24 reports that the ailing Northern Cape mining community has scored an "early Christmas gift" with the opening of the Kuruman One-Stop Health Service Centre that will provide both health and administrative services. The new centre boasts a clinic with dedicated rehabilitation facilities for miners with occupational lung disease. It will also offer assistance with the compensation claims of those who were injured or contracted diseases because of their work. Mobile health facilities will be made available to communities in districts from where the one-stop service centre is not easily accessible. Deputy Mineral Resources Minister Godfrey Oliphant launched the centre on behalf of Deputy President Cyril Ramaphosa on Tuesday. He praised the collaboration between mining houses and other role players in bringing the project to fruition. Community leader Joe Selao said the centre was a perfect early Christmas gift for the "forgotten community of Kuruman". Read this report by Ntozakhe Mthukwane in full at News24
South African poultry association cries foul over work conditions in Brazil Business Report writes that the SA Poultry Association (Sapa) has voiced concern about reports of forced labour and inhuman conditions in Brazil's meat and poultry industries. Brazil is the world's largest exporter of chicken and is the main source of chicken imports to SA. The Washington-based Institute for Agriculture and Trade and Policy recently said that slave labour in Brazil's poultry sector was “endemic” and called for improved working conditions, labour rights and the implementation of employment contracts. Sapa’s Charlotte Nkuna said on Wednesday that they would ask the government to seek an urgent comment from the Brazilian government about the allegations. “Thousands of South African workers have lost their jobs because of dumped chicken imports from countries, including Brazil, which has now been exposed as a country where workers are subject to degrading working conditions and forced labour,” Nkuna stated. She said the government should implement an inspection requirement urgently, while Sapa would raise its concerns about reports of slave labour conditions with the International Poultry Council. SA and Brazil are members of the council. The SA poultry industry has blamed imports for local job losses and has accused the EU and other regions of dumping. Read more of this report by Siseko Njobeni at SA Labour News Other internet posting(s) in this news category
Scheduled feedback session for Uber drivers ends up in standoff with armed security News24 reports that a scheduled feedback session for Uber drivers fearing for their safety took a wrong turn on Tuesday when the company called security, resulting in a standoff outside the Uber offices near the Cape Town International Airport. Driver Zuko Tyaleashe said the group of less than 20 contractors "came in peace", wanting to discuss their safety concerns with the company after the murder of an Uber driver in Belhar just over a week ago. "They told us to come this week. When we did and asked to talk to them, they refused to come and speak to us. Instead they phoned security who surrounded us with guns. They even phoned the police when we did nothing illegal. We didn't even sing!" said Tyaleashe. When asked if Uber had refused to engage with drivers and had sent security out instead, Uber spokesperson Samantha Allenberg said the company was "always willing to engage with drivers on an independent basis through the approved support channels". Read this report by Tammy Petersen in full at News24
800 jobs created in Limpopo by DTI’s Black Industrialist Scheme Business Report writes that a R48 million grant from Department of Trade and Industry (DTI) has created 800 jobs in Modjadjiskloof, Limpopo by a food manufacturing company. The grant came from the DTI’s Black Industrialist Scheme, which aims at growing the global competitiveness of black-owned businesses. Agro-processing manufacturer Eastern Trading, which trades as Dursot All Joy, received the grant of R48 million. "The funding was used for machinery which resulted in an increase in production and job creation", indicated Sales and Marketing Director of Eastern Trading, Ismail Darsot. Deputy Minister of Trade and Industry, Bulelani Magwanishe, expressed his satisfaction with the Black Industrialist Scheme. He added that the expansion project undertaken by Dursot All Joy illustrated what government was capable of doing by means of job creation and global competitiveness. Dursot All Joy found a niche in the agro-processing sector to the investment value of R120 million. The R48 million grant afforded Dursot with the means of installing modern technology and their production outcome has tripled. Local farmers were also benefiting from the scheme, Magwanishe noted. Read this report by Zeenat Vallie in full at Business Report Other internet posting(s) in this news category
SARS has lost 506 employees since start of year News24 reports that the SA Revenue Service (SARS) has lost 506 employees since the start of the year. This was revealed in response to a parliamentary question posed by Democratic Alliance (DA) MP Alf Lees who wanted to know the extent of the brain drain at the agency and the reasons for employees leaving. Commenting on the response, Lees said SARS had lost nearly 7,500 years of experience since the start of the year. Of those who had left, one had a doctorate, 15 had masters degrees, 24 had honours degrees and 88 people had degrees. Customer service, administration, and auditing lost the highest number of staff members, making up almost half of those who had left the organisation since the start of the year. Of those who left, 103 departed to pursue other career opportunities, another 81 declined to offer a reason, and 85 said they had left for personal reasons. Lees commented: "Considering the critical role SARS plays in the South African economy, serious intervention cannot be delayed any further.” Read this report by Jan Bornman in full at News24. Read the official parliamentary response at Politicsweb. Read the DA’s press statement in this regard at DA Newsroom High number of vacant public service posts expected to affect service delivery BusinessLive writes that the public service is expected to run into service delivery constraints in the next few years as a tenth of posts in national and provincial government departments are vacant. Up to 134,919 of the public service’s 1,307,552 posts are vacant, according to the third quarter report on the public service by the Public Service Commission (PSC). In the period from July to end-September, 74,118 (55%) of the vacancies were at an administrative operating level, while 58,567 were for posts "at the coalface of service delivery", according to the commission. The public service also terminated 7,975 appointments compared with making 6,004 new appointments. This comes amid the Treasury’s efforts to curb spending on the public service by freezing the posts. Observers have raised concern this could compromise delivery in key functions such as healthcare and education. The reasons for service terminations include retirement, resignations, abscondment, contract expiry, death and dismissals. With the pressure for service delivery at odds with the pressure to keep the public service wage bill contained, the Department of Public Service and Administration is expected to have a gruelling round of public wage negotiations. Read this report by Khulekani Magubane in full at BusinessLive
Spending on education necessities being sacrificed to fund bloated wage bill An analysis by the Financial Mail reveals that over the past three years provincial education departments have quietly shed 2,800 jobs, or 0.5% of their workforce, yet increased their collective spending on personnel by a whopping 22.3%. Their total compensation for employees, which included non-teaching personnel, rose from R135.6bn in 2013/2014 to R165.9bn in 2016/2017, while the head count fell from 519,817 to 517,018. The soaring wage bill is already crowding out spending on necessities such as textbooks. The lion’s share of provincial education budgets is spent on personnel, most of whom are teachers, with allocations ranging from 82.4% of the total in KwaZulu-Natal to 72.7% in Gauteng. SA Democratic Teachers’ Union (Sadtu) general secretary Maluleke Mugwena said the problem stemmed from the pay structure that was introduced to end a month-long public sector strike in 2007. This included an "occupation-specific dispensation", which was not fully budgeted for. Economist Mike Schüssler said the 2007 pay structure introduced so many promotional notches per salary level that a teacher could stay on the same salary level and get an extra percent every year for 20 years, over and above the inflation-linked pay increases nailed down in each wage settlement. As Treasury noted in the October medium-term budget policy statement, these progressions were intended to reward performance, but they have become largely automatic. Read this informative report by Tamar Kahn in full at Financial Mail Other internet posting(s) in this news category
WSU vows takes action after LLB accreditation withdrawal News24 reports that Walter Sisulu University (WSU) says it will not accept defeat after the Council for Higher Education (CHE) withdrew its Bachelor of Laws (LLB) programme accreditation. The university has been confronted with some challenges that led to the council's decision to withdraw its accreditation. This means WSU cannot offer the programme anymore, and will have to re-apply for accreditation from scratch, with a new submission. The institution can still take in new students in 2018, but it will not be able to do so in 2019. Following its National Review of the Bachelor of Laws (LLB) Programme, CHE said that the University of Limpopo, the University of Zululand and the University of Cape Town (UCT), had also been informed that their accreditation could be withdrawn. The institutions have until May 2018 to respond to the concerns raised by the CHE. WSU spokesperson Yonelwa Tukwayo said they have put measures in place to sort out some of the issues raised by the council. One of the issues the council had raised was a lack of infrastructure. "They are 100% correct. Our infrastructure is not up to standard [and] we are also underfunded and we sit with books full of debt. The other point is that we don't have enough professors," Tukwayo indicated. The programme is offered in Mthatha in the Eastern Cape, which is a rural area, so it is difficult to get professors to work in the area. Read this report by Jeanette Chabalala in full at News24
PSA to proceed with legal action against Gigaba over PIC concerns News24 reports that the Public Servants Association (PSA) said this week it planned to continue with legal action against Finance Minister Malusi Gigaba to protect the pension investments of public servants. This will be despite a letter from Gigaba asking for a meeting in January with union leaders over the matter. Gigaba’s continued failure to respond to the substance of the union’s demands left it with no other option, the union said in a statement. The PSA indicated that it had requested the minister in three separate letters to engage with labour about the management of public servants’ pension monies in the Government Employees’ Pension Fund (GEPF) as invested through the Public Investments Corporation (PIC). But over the past three months the minister had simply ignored the correspondence. This compelled the PSA’s attorneys to issue a letter of compliance to the minister at the end of November. The minister’s reply indicated that a meeting with the union would be scheduled during the third week of January 2018, but it did not address the specific issues raised by the PSA. The PIC board is appointed by the finance minister. Read this report by Yolandi Groenewald in full at Fin24 PSA reckons GEPF members lost more than R12bn in Steinhoff scandal selloff EWN reports that the Public Servants Association (PSA) has called for the safeguarding of pension investments, saying that more than R12 billion has been lost following allegations of accounting irregularities at Steinhoff. Global retailer Steinhoff International lost more than 63% of its stock value on the JSE on Wednesday after CEO Markus Jooste stepped down. The scandal has further ignited calls for more focus and interrogation of corruption in the private sector. German police are conducting a criminal investigation. The PSA, which represents more than 230,000 members of the Government Employees Pension Fund (GEPF), said that that members have lost billions through losses in investments in Steinhoff. Tahir Maepa of the PSA said: “This is quite shocking for us that R12 billion of our hard-earned money is just gone. This is what the PSA has been saying for months gone. We need to relook the investment scheme of the Government Employees' Pension Fund.” A short report by Gia Nicolaides EWN. Read too, Government pensions to be hit hard by Steinhoff scandal, at eNCA. And also, Dark days as Steinhoff loses R100 billion, at Business Report
Accountant convicted of fraud to spend eight years in jail after failing to pay back the money DispatchLive reports that disgraced Cape Town chartered accountant Willem Roux Mouton‚ found guilty last year of defrauding the Eastern Cape Development Corporation (ECDC) in 2012 after stealing R1.3m meant to boost a small business‚ will spend the next eight years in jail. This after Mouton failed to pay back the money as he was ordered to do by the court last year. After he was found guilty of one count of theft and one count of fraud on 5 October 2016‚ the East London regional court gave Mouton an ultimatum to pay back the money within a nine-month period. His eight year jail sentence was suspended for five years and was only set to commence if he didn't pay the money. ECDC approached the court this year after Mouton made no payment. Read this report by Malibongwe Dayimani in full at TimesLive Other internet posting(s) in this news category
All Ladysmith taxi operations suspended after violence in area Business Report writes that KwaZulu-Natal (KZN) MEC for Transport, Community Safety and Liaison, Mxolisi Kaunda, has announced a shutdown of taxi operations in Ladysmith. Last week, the MEC held a high level security meeting in Ladysmith in order to address the surge in taxi violence in the area. He said that the decision to call off operations had been informed by "several meetings and interventions". Taxi operations in the area have been suspended for the next 6 months, effective from Thursday. Operators found to be involved in the violence have been warned and stand to lose their operating licenses. Kaunda’s decision is persunat to the deaths of 11 people following a taxi-violence related shootout last week. The MEC also visited the RTI Ladysmith offices where 60 illegally operated taxis were impounded. Read this report in full at Business Report
SA companies contributed R9 billion in corporate social investment in 2016/17 Business Report writes that South African companies contributed R9 billion in corporate social investment (CSI) in 2016/2017, compared with that only R1.5bn that was achieved two decades ago. This information was revealed in the 20th annual publication of Business in Society Handbook, which was launched by CSI consultancy Trialogue on Wednesday. Of the R9bn in contributions, education accounted for almost half the CSI spend, and this was followed by social and community development and health. The critical mining, financial and retail sectors accounted for 62% of total CSI expenditure; and median CSI spend increased to R22 million from the R19m registered last year. The majority of CSI spend was allocated to the economic hubs of Gauteng, Western Cape and KwaZulu-Natal. The proportion of companies (45%) that reported non-cash giving this year was also significantly higher than last year (35%). Companies mainly directed their CSI spending through non-profit organisations (NPOs), with the percentage of corporate giving to NPOs increasing to 89%,, from last year’s 82%. Read this report by Luyolo Mkentane in full at Business Report
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