Skills Development Bill [B81-98]: discussion

LABOUR PORTFOLIO COMMITTEE
8 September 1998
SKILLS DEVELOPMENT BILL: DISCUSSION

SUMMARY
The committee decided that the Skill Development Bill would be finalised next week irrespective of when the Skill Development Levies Bill is tabled.

DETAILED MINUTES
The Chairperson, Mr Oliphant, asked the Director-General (Mr Pityana) to inform the committee when the Skills Development Levies Bill would be tabled. Mr Pityana said that the two Bills complement one another. They were only separated because the Constitution requires that a money bill be tabled by the Minister of Finance. He said that he has seen a draft of the Bill and it was consistent with the NEDLAC agreement. The Ministers of Finance and Labour will be having a meeting tomorrow (9 September 1998) to discuss the date of the tabling. Hence the Labour Committee might still be able to debate both Bills simultaneously.

Mr Fourie (NP) re-iterated that his party would like to debate both Bills together.
Ms Thebethe (ANC) alerted the committee to the delay which could occur to the NCOP cycle if they wait for the tabling of the Skills Development Levies Bill. Mr Bunting (ANC) remarked that it was disadvantageous to discuss the two Bills separately.

The Chairperson proposed that the committee meet next week Tuesday to finalise the Skills Development Bill with or without the Levies Bill. He said that if the need arose, the Levies Bill could be fast tracked.

Finally, the Chairperson went through outstanding issues the committee needed to tackle before the end of the parliamentary session. These included the Job summit, the amendments to the Unemployment Insurance Fund (which is still being processed by NEDLAC), the tabling of the amendments to the Labour Relations Act and the implementation schedule of the department.