Redrafting delays minimum wage bill

THE Labour Department has integrated written and oral submissions into the redrafted national minimum wage and other labour bills.

This is according to spokesperson Teboho Thejane, who said yesterday the redrafted bills would be sent to Parliament this week. He said they were expected to follow committee processes before they were discussed by MPs.

The move takes place as the department is pinning its hopes on President Cyril Ramaphosa signing into law the national minimum wage in August or September.

“We were hoping that today (May 1) we were going to implement the national minimum wage, but unfortunately due to parliamentary processes we are unable to do so,” the department’s director-general, Thobile Lamati, said when interviewed by the national broadcaster.

“It is a question of finalising a few issues that are part of parliamentary processes,” Lamati said.

On April 20, the labour portfolio committee referred the national minimum wage and other labour bills to the department for redrafting after issues were raised via written and oral submissions.

Lamati said the department was to go back to Parliament this week. “The portfolio committee has to go through the bill clause by clause to satisfy itself that everything they said must be redrafted has been redrafted,” he added.

But the bills do not feature in the portfolio committee’s agenda for today.

Derrick America, a committee member, said it was envisaged the national minimum wage and other labour bills would be considered by the committee from next week.

Committee acting chairperson Sharome van Schalkwyk could not be reached for comment.

Lamati said that once the committee was through with processing the redrafted bills, they would go to the National Assembly and then the National Council of Provinces.