SA's plan to get people working

Johannesburg - The government is planning to broaden its employment service as one of the measures intended to reduce the high levels of joblessness.

Labour Minister Membathisi Mdladlana said: “"We hope to table a bill in parliament and initiate discussions at the National Economic Development and Labour Council by the end of this month [May}.”

He said the bill seeks to make it law for labour department offices to extend their services to the unemployed.

"We want businesses which are recruiting to come to our offices to look at the register of the unemployed when they are filling vacancies. We already have a database of people who are drawing benefits from the Unemployment Insurance Fund," he said.

Mdladlana’s comments came in the week that Statistics SA said that 171 000 people were pushed towards poverty as they lost their jobs in the first three months of 2010.

This figure moved to 6.1 million the number of employable people who are on the streets. This number is nearly a third of the country’s total workforce, estimated at 19 million people.

Last year, one million people were left jobless by the recession. Economists say that job losses have emerged as one of the blots on President Jacob Zuma’s first year in office.

They say creating jobs in an economy faced with rising input costs, such as electricity and water, would be particularly difficult.

An economist, who preferred to remain anonymous, said: "The government needs to encourage business to make long-term investment decisions that can lead to job creation. At the moment, Zuma appears to be caught up in the battles within the divided ANC. That is robbing the country of decisive leadership as the economy emerges from the recession."

Even though unemployment appears to be on the rise, Mdladlana said the government would not consider relaxing some of the labour laws.

"There is no empirical evidence that supports the suggestion that labour flexibility leads to increased employment," he said.

Mdladlana said a model linking the country’s macro-economic policy more closely with its socio-economic position appears to be a better option.

"We need to have a discussion about the rand because its wild fluctuation is causing problems for employment in the economy," he said. 

Another suggestion being considered by the labour department is strengthening youth development programmes with role players, such as the National Youth Development Agency and the Public Works Programme.

"Some of the jobs may be short term but the skills acquired can be a lifetime investment," Mdladlana said.

An analyst said the ability of the informal sector to continue to create employment is questionable, because when people lose their jobs they also lose their ability to raise loans to start small businesses.

Statistics on employers in the informal sector show that many people who create jobs are those who start small firms after losing their jobs.

The government-sponsored training lay-off intervention is achieving mixed success.

Mdladlana said the only companies that were retraining their employees were in the metals industry.

He said: "It appears that other companies see the recession as an opportunity to restructure and retrench without considering retaining the staff."

 - City Press