Welcoming wages

THE Federation of Unions of SA (Fedusa) has welcomed the passing the National Minimum Wage Bill by the National Council of Provinces, which now makes it ready to be signed and promulgated into the National Minimum Wage Act by President Cyril Ramaphosa.

As then deputy president, Ramaphosa was instrumental in securing an agreement on a national floor of wages below which no worker in our country should be paid, between the social partners of organised labour, constituted by Cosatu, Fedusa, Nactu Business and the government at the National Economic Development Labour Council (Nedlac).

The act will prescribe a minimum wage of R3 500 a month for the nonagricultural sector, which translates into about R20 an hour for a 40-hour week and will lift an estimated 6 million workers who earn below this amount out of abject poverty, give them dignity and lay a solid foundation towards closing stark income and social inequality in the country.

Strict compliance mechanisms have been built into this new law, which will be reviewed every two years to factor in lessons learnt on the ground and to adjust it for inflation.

During the difficult negotiations over two years with the social partners of business and government at Nedlac, Fedusa, Cosatu and Nactu had wanted a minimum wage of R26 an hour on the basis of research it had commissioned on the poverty datum line in South Africa, but had to settle for R20 an hour to set in motion the long-delayed process towards a living wage.

Versions of the national minimum wage (NMW) previously known as sectoral determinations, that are announced every year for farm and domestic workers – at about R8 an hour – will be increased by more than 10% and collapsed into 90% and 80% respectively of the new national floor of R20 an hour once the National Minimum Wage Act has been promulgated, and minimum wages for these vulnerable sectors will be gradually increased to the NMW level.