by Anthea Jeffrey, The South African Institute of Race Relations, February 8, 2011

The Cabinet used the festive season to unveil five new bills: four labour, one on land. All five supposedly aim to help the poor, but their predictable effect will be to worse unemployment and build dependence on the State. Apart from the controversial Protection of Information Bill, these five bills are the firs major legislative intervention by President Jacob Zuma’s administration. They bode ill for South Africa, as the Institute’s in-house legal expert, Dr Anthea Jeffrey, explained at a briefing in Johannesburg on February 2011…In addition, the outsourcing of cleaning and other services has become an important way of promoting the preferential procurement required by the BEE of good practice. Under the bill, however, of a major corporation outsources or sub-contracts its catering needs to a BEE firm, the corporation will be liable for unfair labour practice by the BEE entity. As the RIA warms, this could ‘create a significant disincentive to supply chain diversification and have a negative impact on small business and job creation.’ Read more…