Aug-Sept 2014 K.indd

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AUG/SEPT 2014 • www.cosatu.org.za

A view from NEDLAC chambers

NEDLAC, 20 Years On: A Brief Re fl ection By Patrick Phelane

T he 23rd November 2014 marks the 20th anniversary of the signing into law the National Economic Development and Labour Council Act (NEDLAC). NED LAC is one of the key post-1994 institu tions meant to strengthen participatory democracy. In terms of section 3(1) of the NEDLAC Act, organised labour, or ganised business, organised commu nity and the government must be rep resented in NEDLAC. Before the establishment of NED LAC, socioeconomic issues were en gaged through the National Economic Forum (NEF). The NEF was formed after a massive anti-Value Added Tax (VAT), strike led by COSATU and the National Council of Trade Unions (NACTU). That resulted in the restructuring of the Na tional Manpower Commission to form NEF as a platform for consultation with labour when far reaching socio-eco nomic policies are introduced. Since the inception of NEDLAC, the labour constituency has and is still comprised of the Congress of South African Trade Unions (COSATU), the Federation of

Unions of South Africa (FEDUSA) 1 and NACTU. Organised business is repre sented by Business Unity South Africa, BUSA. 2 While the composition of NEDLAC is modelled along the lines of the Inter national Labour Organisation, ILO, it is unique in the sense that it accommo dates the community constituency as opposed to ILO’s tripartism. However, the community constituency is not rep resented on all the chambers of NED LAC. There are four chambers 3 ; viz., Public Finance and Monetary Policy Chamber (PFMC), Trade and Industry Chamber (TIC), Labour Market Cham ber (LMC) and Development Chamber (DC). The community constituency is represented on the PFMC and the DC. The NEDLAC chambers are the engines of the institution; it is in the chambers where policy negotiations take place. 4 To ensure that thorough work is done in policy negotiations, the chambers establish task teams from time to time to engage technical issues before them. Once the task teams have fi na lised their work, the chambers sign off

the reports.

The LMC is empowered by the NED LAC Act (section 5(1)(c) to consider all proposed labour legislation and labour market policies before they are intro duced in Parliament. Sections 5(1)(b), 5(1)(d) and 5(1)(e) provide for social dialogue in order to reach consensus on socio-economic policy issues. How ever, not all government departments show commitment in ensuring that so cioeconomic policies are negotiated at NEDLAC. Classical examples are the Employment Tax Incentive Act and the amendment of Petroleum and Mineral Resources Development Act which we not engaged at NEDLAC despite their potential impact in the economy. The highest management structure of NEDLAC is the Executive Committee which receives and adopts the reports from the chambers. It also convenes the Summit of stakeholders once every year to consider the annual report of NEDLAC.

Worker Issues

1 FEDUSA’s predecessor, which was part of the formation of NEDLAC, is Federation of South African Labour, FEDSAL. 2 In 2011, the National African Federated Chamber of Commerce, NAFCOC and the Black Business Executive Circle withdrew from BUSA and later formed the Black Business Council (BBC) 3 The organised labour chamber conveners are Isaac Ramputa (SASBO), Tony Ehrenreich (COSATU WC) and Mduduzi Mbongwe (SACCAWU) for PFMC, TIC and LMC respectively. The DC convener position is vacant and will be fi lled shortly 4 The COSATU Policy Coordinators have started proving updates in this publication on the work of chambers