Forging a better deal for SA's workers

The current debate about whether we need to create jobs or create decent work that ensures the protection of workers' dignity and rights as a matter of principle is not apolitical or ideologically neutral.

On one hand, you have those who own the means of production shouting from rooftops for more labour market flexibility and advancing a "half a bread is better than nothing" ideology. On the other hand are the workers, who are advocating the protection of secure employment.

Since the beginning of 2009, South Africa has lost 1.17 million jobs, plunging 5.85 million more family members of those jobless workers into the ranks of the poor. The international financial crisis found South Africa already in a deep economic crisis that is decades old.

Parallel to this newest wave of job losses is the accelerating casualisation of labour and the mushrooming of labour brokers, which is rapidly replacing relatively well-paid and secure jobs with low-paid, short-term employment with no security and no benefits.

A report by the Adcorp Employment Index revealed that while jobs overall had declined by an annualised 2.41% by November 2010, the number of permanent workers had decreased most, by 2.74%, while the number of temporary workers had decreased by only 1.60%. Meanwhile, the number of "agency" workers (those employed by labour brokers) had increased by 5.59%.

The survey showed that there were nearly 100000 more labour-broker workers than previously estimated. They now represent 6.8% of total employment and 23.2% of the country's temporary and part-time workforce. This is having a devastating negative effect on the levels of pay, job security and benefits for thousands of workers.

I wrote this article while attending a meeting of the International Trade Union Council's general council, where delegate after delegate spoke of the phenomenon in almost every country where an employer's response to the financial crisis was simply to substitute previously better-paying and secure jobs with atypical and precarious forms of employment.

In short, big business wants workers to pay for a crisis created by their own elastic greed. Left alone, employers will bribe every political formation to help advance their argument. This is the context in which we should approach the debate about decent work.

The International Labour Organisation's Convention on Decent Work commits signatories to support:

�An income which allows the working individual a good life;

� Everybody having an equal chance to develop themselves at work, and no discrimination;

� Proper and safe working conditions;

� Trade unions allowed, and a real say in work-related matters in place; and

� A state-supported social safety net for the sick, weak, elderly and expecting women.

Most countries, including South Africa, have signed this convention, yet millions of workers around the world work and live in appalling conditions which come nowhere near the reasonable and minimal standards defined by the ILO. South Africa is no exception.

Cosatu's 10th national congress, noting this dramatic increase in atypical forms of employment, resolved to step up its Jobs and Poverty Campaign for decent work.

The ANC national conference in 2007 resolved to pursue a programme of economic transformation based on various pillars, the first of which was "making the creation of decent work opportunities the primary focus of economic policies".

This was followed by the 2009 ANC election manifesto, which identified five priority areas for the next five years, the first of which was "the creation of decent work and sustainable livelihoods".

This refutes completely the view that there is major difference within the tripartite alliance. The ANC, Cosatu and SACP are all mandated and committed to the creation of decent work. Any statement attacking decent work would be not only a betrayal of the ANC 2009 election platform, but a massive political fraud.

The government is now debating changes to various labour laws to try to plug the loopholes in the current labour laws, which are supposed to protect workers' rights to decent standards of employment.

Cosatu is ready to engage with the minister of labour "to deal with the problem associated with labour brokering".

The biggest problem with labour laws is that they are not being effectively enforced. The Department of Labour has not nearly enough inspectors, and many employers routinely flout the laws and continue to exploit workers, particularly those who are desperate for any kind of job. Some unions are simply not strong enough to enforce the legislative gains.

The combination of the two weaknesses translates into large sections of workers falling into a category of what is known to be vulnerable workers who are the working poor. These include taxi drivers, security guards, and farm, retail, entertainment and domestic workers.

The cold reality of the growing number of workers is that the constitution and a plethora of progressive labour legislation are irrelevant. Many employers have simply found new strategies to sideline their obligations not only to workers, but to the environment and broader human rights-based society.

Yet employers' organisations and their mouthpieces in the Democratic Alliance are foaming at the mouth at the prospect of new laws to promote decent work and protect workers' rights. They have resurrected the absurd argument that employed workers are a privileged elite whose high wages and "inflexible" labour laws prevent employers from taking on new workers and are thus responsible for the high level of unemployment.

This argument is both factually wrong and economically illiterate. The reality is that the share of wages in national income dropped from 50% in 1994 to 45% in 2009.

What annoys workers about this propaganda about "privileged" employees is that it comes from the mouths of the real elite, the leaders of big business who have amassed fabulous fortunes and their well-paid spokesmen in the media and universities.

Between 1995 and 2008, the Gini coefficient, which measures a country's level of inequality, has risen from 0.64 to 0.68, making South Africa the most unequal society in the world.

The Sunday Times revealed that the number of South African billionaires nearly doubled from 16 in 2009 to 31 in 2010 and that the country's 20 richest men enjoyed a 45% increase in wealth.

Pine Pienaar, CEO of Mvelaphanda Resources, made R63-million in 2009, 4000 times as much as a farm worker getting the R1316.69 minimum wage.

On average, the poorest 10% of earners get R1275 a month, which is 0.57% of total earnings, while the top 10% get R111733, which is 49.2% of the total!

Yet, this super-rich elite bemoan the damage done to the economy by "excessive" wage claims by workers and "inflexible" labour laws and warn us that we cannot afford to implement the ANC's promise of decent work.

The standards of decent work defined by the ILO are the bare minimum workers can be expected to survive on. No trade union will ever accept that workers should have to live below that minimum and we will fight tooth and nail to not only prevent the deterioration of conditions, but also for bigger increases and tighter, better-enforced labour laws.

�Vavi is general secretary of Cosatu