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Johannesburg - A group consisting of representatives from labour, business and industry associations have demanded several measures from government to stem an imminent jobs "bloodbath" in the steel sector.
This followed a joint approach by labour, business and industry associations to government on Friday, where they sought a "firm commitment to reassess their policies which are contributing to sweeping away jobs in the steel industry".
Solidarity metal industry head Marius Croucamp, reading a joint statement to media in Johannesburg on Monday, said: "The meeting was significant in relation to the fact that we had approached government with one voice, irrespective of our differences."
They concluded a 10-page submission in which they outlined their "collective call for government to urgently address the current crisis in the steel industry, failing which we will be faced with a disastrous and devastating impact on our economy".
The stakeholders were the United Association of South Africa, the Metal and Electrical Workers Unions of SA, ArcelorMittal SA [JSE:ACL], the Steel and Engineering Industries Federation of Southern Africa, the National Union of Metalworkers of SA, Evraz Highveld Steel [JSE:EHS], Cape Gate, the Scaw Metals Group, Macsteel Coil Processing and Solidarity.
The core demands the group made in their submission included:
- Immediate trade remedies for steel;
- Urgent roll-out of government's infrastructure programmes;
- Transparency of current state-owned enterprises' capital programmes;
- Monitoring of imports;
- Banning of steel scrap exports; and
- Establishing a steel crisis committee.
