Department of Labour 2017/18 Audit; High Level Panel recommendations for Labour

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Employment and Labour

05 September 2018
Chairperson: Mr B Mashile (ANC)
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Meeting Summary

The Auditor-General of South Africa (AGSA) briefed the Portfolio Committee on Labour on the audit outcomes of the Department and its entities.

The AG reported the labour portfolio has experienced a slight improvement in audit outcomes compared to the previous year. However, the auditees still did not improve on the quality of financial statements submitted. In addition, there were material findings on the annual performance reports as well as non-compliance with key legislations. The UIF (Unemployment Insurance Fund) and SEE (Supported Employment Enterprises) particularly addressed material misstatements identified in the previous years and this resulted in improvement of the audit outcomes whilst the audit outcomes of Department of Labour (DoL) and CCMA remained stagnant.

The portfolio had an improvement in terms of the quality of the annual performance report (APR) and annual performance plan (APP) submitted for audit. The UIF and SEE implemented responsive action plans to address internal control deficiencies identified in previous years and, therefore, there were no material findings relating to performance information identified in the year under review. Adequate reviews of performance information were not done on the Compensation Fund, CCMA, and DoL. In some instances management was slow in addressing internal control deficiencies.

The portfolio did not improve on compliance with legislations from the prior years as material findings were identified. On expenditure and contract management, the portfolio did not take effective steps to prevent irregular and fruitless and wasteful expenditure. Furthermore, the supply chain prescripts were not followed when awards were made. The regression was continuing to remain a concern as in the current year all entities in the portfolio have findings in this area. Transgressions were not always investigated, and appropriate disciplinary steps were not taken as required by National Treasury regulations. The number of investigations taking place at the Compensation Fund was significant. As a result, the Special Investigation Unit investigated an allegation of financial misconduct at the request of the Minister.

The Committee content adviser briefed the Committee on the recommendations of the High Level Panel (HLP) report concerning the labour sector. The summary report focused on poverty, unemployment and the equitable distribution of wealth. The report reflected that only 40% of adult black Africans were employed in 2016 while the figures for Coloured, Indian and White South Africans were 50%, 54% and 63%, respectively. Statistics South Africa figures for the first quarter of 2018 were similar to the 2016 except for the employment figure of the Indian population which was down to 53%. Furthermore, the report reflected that only 13% of the population from 15 to 24 years was employed in 2016 while 51% of those from 25 to 34 years were employed. The figure for those from 35 to 54 years was over 60%. There was a slight change in the figures for the first quarter of 2018 in that employment was 12% for those from 15 to 24 years and 49% for those from 25 to 34 years.

The Department presented to the Committee inputs from the Public Employment Services (PES) on the HLP. The Department reported it was providing unemployment insurance fund payments to those that lose their employment in order to people out of poverty. It also provided income support or life pensions to those that get injured on duty. The Department through its 126 labour centres located close to the communities was able to take services closer to the people, and has also implemented self help kiosks which made it easier for citizens to receive services.

The HLP also found that South Africa was continuing to experience high levels of incidents of racism, racial discrimination and xenophobic attacks despite the existence of several laws aimed at eliminating racism and other forms of discrimination. Through the Employment Equity Legislation, the Department has issued codes of practice that protect worker rights and which also protect against unfair discrimination. The Department of Labour has further made recommendations to the Department of Home Affairs on the issuing of work visas for non-critical skills. This was aimed at promoting local skilled workers from being displaced by foreign labour.

Members asked the AGSA why the Department has been given zero if there have been no findings on compliance; enquired if the AGSA had an obligation to report fraudulent findings to the police or Hawks seeing that the AG always finds nasty things; asked for clarity on what the preference point system was; wanted to find out about the number of allegations not investigated and what their extent was and nature; remarked there was not enough action on consequence management in terms of non-compliance and this was a continuing trend in the public domain and wanted to know if this was a tip of an iceberg; and asked the AG to comment on the complete overhaul of the Compensation Fund that has been pointed out in the presentation.

Members further commented it was a good idea that the DoL and its entities were zooming into social security assistance and quality education even though that was not their business; remarked that the matter dealing with refugees should be handled with care because some of the refugees with skills came here to open businesses and it should be kept in mind that there was an agreement with AU that people were free to go anywhere in Africa to find employment; and remarked it was important to define the people the national minimum wage was targeted at.

Meeting report

Briefing by AGSA
Ms Modiehi Skosana Senior Manager: AGSA, briefed the Committee on the 2017/18 audit outcomes of the Department and its six entities. She reported that the labour portfolio has experienced a slight improvement in audit outcomes compared to the previous year. However, the auditees still did not improve on the quality of financial statements submitted. In addition, there were material findings on the annual performance reports as well as non-compliance with key legislation. The UIF (Unemployment Insurance Fund) and SEE (Supported Employment Enterprises), in particular, addressed material misstatements identified in the previous years and this resulted in improvement of the audit outcomes whilst the audit outcomes of DoL and CCMA remained stagnant.
 
The control environment including the existing accounting systems were still not adequate to produce complete and credible financial statements for the Compensation Fund. Furthermore, there was poor record management that appropriate supporting documentation was not always available. As a result, the AG was unable to express an audit opinion on the financial statements. This has been the case for the past six financial years. The areas where the material misstatements were identified were revenue and receivables; administrative contributions by exempted employers; unlisted investments property, plant and equipment; benefits; provision for outstanding claims; payables; unclaimed monies; cash and cash equivalents; statement of comparison of budget and actual amounts; loans to economic entities; prior period error; related parties; contingencies; and irregular expenditure and fruitless and wasteful expenditure. NEDLAC’s material misstatements on irregular expenditure that were not corrected have resulted in a qualified opinion due to the lack of daily and monthly controls.

The portfolio had an improvement in terms of the quality of the annual performance report (APR) and annual performance plans (APPs) submitted for audit. The UIF and SEE implemented responsive action plans to address internal control deficiencies identified in previous years and, therefore, there were no material findings relating to performance information identified in the year under review. Adequate reviews of performance information were not done on the Compensation Fund, CCMA, and DoL. In some instances management was slow in addressing internal control deficiencies.

The portfolio did not improve on compliance with legislation from the prior years as material findings were identified. On expenditure and contract management, the portfolio did not take effective steps to prevent irregular and fruitless and wasteful expenditure. Furthermore, the supply chain prescripts were not followed when awards were made. The regression remained a concern as in the current year all entities in the portfolio have findings in this area. The portfolio incurred irregular expenditure of R113 million during 2017/18 financial year, with the major contributors being the UIF and CCMA at R45 million and R58.5 million respectively. The AG was unable to verify the completeness of the irregular expenditure as disclosed by the NEDLAC and Compensation Fund for both the current periods. The portfolio further incurred fruitless and wasteful expenditure of R13.9 million of which R9.5million (86 new instances in 2017/18) and R4 million was incurred by the Compensation Fund and the Department, respectively.
Pertaining to consequence management, transgressions were not always investigated, and appropriate disciplinary steps were not taken as required by National Treasury regulations. The number of investigations taking place at the Compensation Fund was significant. As a result, the Special Investigation Unit investigated an allegation of financial misconduct at the request of the Minister. This was a further investigation based on the outcome by an independent consulting firm relating to the allegation of financial misconduct involving previous key officials. The investigation has been completed and the report was finalised and issued in the year under review. The report was still under consideration by the accounting authority to determine the appropriate action to be taken. Regarding revenue management, the Compensation Fund and SEE did not establish systems, procedures and processes to ensure efficient and effective revenue management. This included collecting revenue when it was due and pursuing debtors with appropriate sensitivity and rigor to ensure that amounts receivable were collected. The accounting authority of the Compensation Fund did not maintain an effective control environment to accept, adjudicate, and make payments to the injured as required by sections 22 and 29 of the Compensation for Occupational Injuries and Diseases Act (COIDA).
 
The UIF has turned around the audit outcomes from a disclaimer to an unqualified opinion mainly due to management commitment to improving control environment and extensive involvement during the audit process. Both the UIF and SEE have been working on addressing the weaknesses in control environment and clearing the qualification areas since prior year. The recommendations of internal audit and audit committees as well as those from external audit were given appropriate consideration and implemented to a larger extent. For the remaining auditees there were instances where action plans were not appropriately developed and monitored on a regular basis to ensure improvement on the overall control environment. Daily and monthly controls were not effective in that there were inadequate reviews of financial and performance information. The effectiveness of internal audit function and the audit committee was hampered by the non-availability of credible information in some instances as well as lack of implementation of recommendations made by these governance structures.

Briefing by Content Adviser
Mr Sibongiseni Ngcobo, Committee Content Adviser, stated that the Fourth Democratic Parliament identified the assessment of the impact of legislation passed since 1994 as a key priority to be undertaken by the Fifth Democratic Parliament. This priority was incorporated into the Strategic Plan of Parliament for 2014 – 2019. Subsequently, the High Level Panel (HLP) of eminent South Africans was established by the Speakers Forum in December 2015 to undertake this task. The High Level Panel’s mandate was to review legislation, assess implementation, identify gaps, and propose appropriate remedial measures. The panel’s work was divided into three main thematic areas which were poverty, unemployment and the equitable distribution of wealth; land reform: restitution, redistribution and security of tenure; and social cohesion and nation building. Of more relevance to the Portfolio Committee on Labour is the first thematic area, which is poverty, unemployment and the equitable distribution of wealth. The Working Group on this thematic area was tasked with producing a report on the following focus areas:
-       Growth, poverty and inequality (wage inequality, wealth distribution and inequality, labour regulatory environment, unemployment, and poverty and access to basic services)
-       Unequal access to quality health care
-       Quality education
-       Spatial inequality
-       Skills development
 
The summary focused on the first thematic area (poverty, unemployment and the equitable distribution of wealth). The report of the HLP on unemployment was based on the 2016 statistics of Statistics South Africa. However, the 2018 first quarter statistics did not differ much from the 2016 statistics. As in 2016, of the 37 million people aged between 15 and 64 years, 16 million were employed in the first quarter of 2018. In the first quarter of 2018, 5.98 million people were actively looking for work while there were 5.8 million in 2016. The number of the economically inactive population grew from 12.8 million in 2016 to 15.3 million in the first quarter of 2018.
The report reflected that only 40% of adult black Africans were employed in 2016 while the figures for Coloured, Indian and White South Africans were 50%, 54% and 63%, respectively. Statistics South Africa figures for the first quarter of 2018 were similar to the 2016 except for the employment figure of the Indian population which was down to 53%. Furthermore, the report reflected that only 13% of the population from 15 to 24 years was employed in 2016 while 51% of those from 25 to 34 years were employed. The figure for those from 35 to 54 years was over 60%. There was a slight change in the figures for the first quarter of 2018 in that employment was 12% for those from 15 to 24 years and 49% for those from 25 to 34 years.
 
The report classified the causes of unemployment into three: low levels of employment in agriculture; low rates of economic growth; and skill and capital biases in the economy. The HLP report attributed low economic growth to the following factors:
-       The low accumulation of human capital and skills in South Africa
-       The economy that is dominated by monopolies
-       Large proportion of the population located in rural areas where there is less economic activity;
-       Infrastructure backlogs that raise the cost of economic activity
-       Inefficiencies in the use of scarce resources in key sectors, leading to higher costs and reducing the resources available for other activities
-       High levels of inequality resulting in poor educational and health outcomes, insufficient demand for local products and political environment s that is susceptible to policy uncertainty
-       The high cost of local production which result in diversion of investments to emerging economies of East Asia
 
According to the report, poor health status of the population, weak education system, lack of cooperation between labour and government, inflexible labour laws and high pay in relation to productivity were among the factors that retard economic growth. The report identified the mismatch between skill levels of job seekers and skills required for available job opportunities. The Public Employment Services programme of the Department of Labour was faced with the same challenge of job placements where job seekers in its database did not match available job opportunities.
This problem, the report asserted, was compounded by the government’s labour policy choices. In this regard, the report identified policies that sought to protect vulnerable workers e.g. Basic Conditions of Employment Act and the Labour Relations Act; and wage-setting policies such as the National Minimum Wage Bill that is being processed by Parliament. The report cautioned that while these policies were espoused with good intentions, in the long-run they would push employers to be economical on the use of labour, especially unskilled labour.
With regards to fighting the scourge of unemployment, the panel recommended that the time to register a new business should be reduced including getting appropriate permits, i.e. construction permits, getting telephone and electricity services, registering a property and accessing state sources of business development funding. The panel asserted that these actions, while currently fragmented, could easily be centralised through a single e-governance portal. It further proposed that enterprises below a certain size (in terms of employees) should be exempted from certain regulations including the obligation to pay the minimum wage and specific components of BEE legislation. It suggested that people below a certain age, those that have been unemployed for a long time, people in rural areas and those living with disabilities should be employed without the employer being required to pay the minimum wage on the same terms. The panel also recommended the setting of a separate wage for the vulnerable in the labour market.
It stated that parliament should amend the Labour Relations Act to remove Section 32 which dealt with extension of collective agreements concluded in bargaining councils to non-parties to the collective agreement or to prescribe that the extension to non-parties would not be applicable to small and medium enterprises.
Mr Ngcobo stated that the report of the High Level Panel was referred to Portfolio Committees as well as Joint Rules Committee on 6 June 2018 for consideration and report by 28 September 2018. It was, therefore, recommended that the Department of Labour should be invited to come and present responses to the findings and recommendations of the High Level Panel on the Assessment of Key Legislation and the Acceleration of Fundamental Change.
 
Briefing by Department of Labour
Mr Sam Morotoba, Deputy Director-General: Public Employment Services, DoL, presented to the Committee inputs from the Public Employment Services (PES) on the HLP. He reported that the Department was providing unemployment insurance fund payments to those that lose their employment in order to get people out of poverty. It also provided income support or life pensions to those that get injured on duty. The Department, through its 126 labour centres located close to the communities, was able to take services closer to the people, and has also implemented self help kiosks which made it easier for citizens to receive services.
Apart from the high levels of poverty, the South African society was also marked by very high levels of inequality, much of it racialised. The Department of Labour has a Labour Policy and Research unit that is always able to monitor trends amongst different cohorts of workers through the extensive databases maintained by the PES and UIF. It was indicated that SA does not have a comprehensive data set that could provide robust estimates of wealth inequality.
Mr Morotoba pointed out that the key driver of both poverty and inequality is SA was the fact that a very large proportion of the adult population was unemployed. Because the HLP has recommended that emphasis should be given to reducing the time to register a new business, the Department has streamlined its operations to make it easier for businesses to register for its services, for example:
-   The U-filing system of UIF
-   The C-filing system of the Compensation Fund
-   The ESSA online system
-   The soon to be launched National Minimum Wage Exemption system.
 
The Department has a setup a commission whose task it was to look at the applicability of the National Minimum Wage. The extension of collective agreements would also be reviewed in line with the panel’s recommendations. The Department through the Labour Activation programs of the UIF was also attempting to provide basic training programs to assist those that are unemployed to enter work. The career counsellors employed by the Department were also assisting with counselling and advice.
Because the panel found that persistent racial differences were making it difficult to access socio-economic rights and life opportunities for certain vulnerable groups, the progressive realisation of socio-economic rights in SA was possible only if the government continued to place emphasis on designated groups in existing affirmative action legislation, policies, and programmes. The issue of socio-economic rights was addressed through the legislation administered by the Department and also through the way it provided its services to previously disadvantaged communities.
He further indicated it was important to develop and maintain an effective social security system based on solidarity since this was an indication of one of the principal means of fostering social cohesion. The Department of Labour provides the following forms of social assistance activities:
-   Income Protection through the Unemployment Insurance Fund
-   Protection for injuries on duty
-   Employment Services to assist  work-seekers to access employment
-   Sustained Employment Enterprises to assist those with disabilities
-   Subsidies to National Councils for people with Disability.
 
The HLP also found that South Africa was continuing to experience high levels of incidents of racism, racial discrimination and xenophobic attacks despite the existence of several laws aimed at eliminating racism and other forms of discrimination. Through the Employment Equity legislation, the Department has issued codes of practice that protect worker rights and which also protect against unfair discrimination. The Department has further made recommendations to the Department of Home Affairs on the issuing of work visas for non-critical skills. This was aimed at protecting local skilled workers from being displaced by foreign labour.
In line with the growing concerns around corruption and action taken to combat corruption, there have been concerns raised about the level of independence of key institutions and declining levels of trust in leaders. One reason for this is that, in some instances, the wrong people were appointed to senior positions. This has resulted in a loss of public trust and the institutions they led. The Department has encouraged active citizenships and the building of democracy, mainly through Nedlac. Nedlac has been representing government, business, labour and community. Nedlac has also nominated members that have been participating in the various boards established by labour legislation.

The Department of Labour has been having regular public briefings through Imbizos and campaigns to take services to the people. It has undertaken regular customer satisfaction surveys through its research unit to assess how the public perceived its services. The Department regularly reports to the parliamentary oversight committees on the implementation of the legislation under its review. It further implemented the recommendations of the Auditor General who always provides independent assurance that there was compliance with legislation and monitoring of performance information which are based on how the Department implemented the various pieces of legislation it administers.

Mr Morotoba concluded by stating it should be recalled that the challenge that was facing South African working people was the challenge of the working poor.  Although the majority of people were working they could not afford basic necessities of life. Therefore, the introduction of the minimum wage was meant to address poverty, inequality and unemployment especially amongst the working poor. The approach to labour laws was not premised on a one size fits all approach. The country’s labour laws provided flexibility to any employer who could not afford the minimum wage and went further to provide flexibility on conditions of employment. 

Discussion
Deliberations with AGSA
Mr M Bagraim (DA) wanted to understand why the Department has been given zero if there have been no findings on compliance. Second, he asked if the AG had an obligation to report fraudulent findings to the police or Hawks seeing that the AG always finds nasty things. Third, sought clarity on what the preference point system was. Fourth, he asked about the number of allegations not investigated and what their extent and nature were. Fifth, he wanted to establish what the AG meant by 'leadership' in terms of internal controls. Thereafter, he enquired what the AG meant by the third level assurance that the Committee always provided. Lastly, he asked the AG to comment on the slow response by the Department and entities to improve key control and addressing risk areas.

Ms Kgabo Komape, Business Executive, AGSA, elaborated that by giving the Department zero on no finding on compliance the AG meant to explain that all six entities had no compliance with key laws. The AGSA does not go to SAPS or Hawks to report fraudulent findings. The mandate of the AGSA is to report to leadership, management of the entities, and oversight structures. She also explained that 'leadership' referred to responsibility by senior management to put measures in place and to implement policies and procedures it has finalised and approved. Action plans should be driven at a higher level to ensure they were implemented. On third level assurance provided by Committee, she indicated this referred to things that the AG requested the Committee to incorporate when it exercises oversight. If those things were done, like producing a report to be adopted by the House, then that meant the Committee has given the AG an assurance.
Ms Skosana explained that the preference point system was being used when bidders submitted information for bidding. National Treasury prescribed that points be calculated according to the BEE status, price, and functionality. What the AG has discovered was that the awards were not done according the preference point system or National Treasury prescripts. Concerning allegations investigated, she indicated there were 186 investigations in the report. The Compensation Fund had more than 75 investigations which were longer than 12 months.  Most of the investigations were in the Compensation Fund. About the slow response by the Department and its entities, she stated it was mainly the Compensation Fund’s finance section where officials were unable to draft financial statements at the expected level in order to interpret compliance as requested by legislation.
Ms S Van Schalkwyk (ANC) asked for clarity on the completeness of amounts that could not be confirmed. She indicated that amounts prior audit and post audit were usually more. She wanted to understand if completeness of amounts referred to larger amounts. Second, she remarked there was not enough action on consequence management in terms of non-compliance and this was a continuing trend in the public domain. She then wanted to know if this was a tip of an iceberg. She further asked the AGSA to comment on the complete overhaul of the Compensation Fund that has been pointed out in the presentation.
 
Ms Van Schalkwyk asked about the location of the problems because there have been action plans for the Compensation Fund in the past four years which did not yield any positive results. Finally, she asked if the Compensation Fund had the required skills or if there was a mismatch of skills.
Ms Skosana elaborated that the amount that was shown as completeness on irregular expenditure (R113 million) was not complete because the Compensation Fund and Nedlac did not provide information that supported the amount disclosed. This meant there could be more irregular expenditure. She added that if action plans were properly implemented and monitored well, the audit outcomes would be different. But if the action plans were badly implemented and monitored, they would not produce positive results. Pertaining to consequence management, she reported that investigations and limitations of scope at the Compensation Fund were making the environment not conducive to say the situation was what it was. There were investigations on fraud and financial misconduct that took long, including disciplinary cases that have been dragging for long and others not taking place. She further admitted there were gaps in the competencies of the Compensation Fund and lack of holding staff accountable. If such a culture was allowed to brew, that would have an impact on service delivery and would be reflected by the AGSA. Regarding action plans of the Compensation Fund, she explained the AGSA always incorporates the disclaimer of previous years and indicates where to better things. The AGSA has always asked the Compensation Fund to indicate what went wrong so that there could be interventions. Providing credible documents to auditors has remained a challenge with the Compensation Fund. Because the environment was not transparent, it became difficult for the AG to do its work. Lastly, in trying to overhaul the Compensation Fund, she pointed out the AG has gone to basics to ensure business processes were aligned to what the entity wanted to achieve and a culture of excellence was being encouraged.
The Chairperson remarked that the Public Audit Amendment Bill was passed by the National Assembly to empower the AG to enforce compliance. He wanted to know if the AGSA has come across entities that have got credible audit committees that have produced reports with recommendations to management and if there were any signs the management has tried to implement the reports’ recommendations. He had observed a trend where there were entities (DOL and CCMA) during the 2013/14 financial period that were in the yellow areas. Then during the past five years those entities could have either deteriorated or improved, but that did not happen and there were others who were drowning or improving or going to the green area. He asked if this meant there were people who did not want to go either down or up.
Ms Komape elaborated that all six auditees had functional audit committees, but recommendations were not implemented in time. She said when you look at the reports, you then go through the internal control deficiencies that you needed to attend to and you discover they were not given consideration in time. The urgency to respond to such matters was not where it was supposed to be. The entities were not there yet. The SEE (Supported Employment Enterprises) and UIF (Unemployment Insurance Fund) corrected things before the AG picked them up on the internal control deficiencies.
The Chairperson said it was clear the Department and its entities were not following action plans and producing financial statements that were complying with National Treasury regulations and could not account for irregular expenditure. All these pointed badly to the capacity of the people who were running the Department and its entities.

Deliberations with the DOL
Mr Bagraim commented that most businesses were struggling because of the economic climate and to retrench was not an easy option, and this would make it difficult to meet the employment equity targets. He further stated the matter dealing with refugees should be handled with care because some of the refugees with skills came here to open businesses. It should be kept in mind that there was an agreement with AU that people were free to go anywhere in Africa to find employment. That could have unintended consequences. He also indicated the Committee would like to see regulations on minimum wage so that it could have an input even though it would be difficult for the Committee to inspect some of the matters related to minimum wage.
 
Ms Van Schalkwyk commented it was a good idea that the DOL and its entities were zooming into social security assistance and quality education even though that was not their business. In terms of challenges mentioned, she wanted to know if the Department had timeframes attached to the areas it might have an influence on. If the timeframes were non-existent, she urged the Department to work in collaboration with other sister departments. She further indicated the Committee had seen recommendations on minimum wage from different sectors and it had agreed to disagree on certain things. She admitted there were provisions on the regulations for different sectors and the Committee has to zoom in on these regulations.
Mr Virgil Seafield, Deputy Director-General: Labour Policy and Industrial Relations, DoL, informed the Committee that the inability and intransigence of the industry to transform was clear in the equity reports that were received yearly.  The Committee needed to engage with Employment Equity Act, but that depended on the programme of Parliament regarding the amendments e.g. enforcement of legislation and regulations in order to serve as a catalyst to the labour market for change. The Committee needed to engage on why the labour market was refusing to change. With regard to minimum wage, he indicated the Labour Commission  has to deal with the effects and impacts of the implementation of the national minimum wage. It would also deal with the risks that might arise out of the implementation of the minimum wage. The law talked of exemptions and flexibility in order to address the concerns of the industry. He pointed out the Committee was favoured when the national minimum wage  was discussed because the minimum wage was seen to be the tool to facilitate the growth of the economy, redress the imbalances in the country, and provide the basis for addressing inequality. The basis of this legislation was premised on voluntarism, and therefore, this meant the legislation did not carry penalties. He also revealed that 46% of South Africans were paid less than the national minimum wage.
 
The Chairperson remarked it was important to define the people the national minimum wage was targeted at. He asked if it was right to have 30 million people not working compared to 16 million people working but not earning a minimum wage. This was problematic and the Committee needed to ask itself if this was what the country needed.
 
Mr Bagraim stated there was a job summit coming soon to address some of the challenges in the labour market. There were small businesses that wanted to create work but work was being given to big companies. When people struggle to find work, then that affects all of us. When a person can not find a job, this meant four or five people would not be looked after. The Committee was trying to create a balance. It did not want the working poor people and those who do not work at all. The biggest challenge facing the country was job creation and earning something.
 
The Chairperson stated that in a free market system, the market adjusts and moves towards balancing itself out. He stated he did not agree with this assertion that if you want to bring the minimum wage into action, the entrepreneur would walk out and find alternatives or move to another country where there would be saturation. All what the Committee wanted was to reduce the amount of unemployed people while ensuring those working were getting decent wages. He urged the Department to work with the content advisor to draw a table on the challenges and interventions proposed.
 
The meeting was adjourned.
 

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