Johannesburg - Labour Minister Mildred Oliphant delivered some hard truths to Cosatu’s congress yesterday, accusing some of its leaders of supporting labour brokers.
The minister also asked why Cosatu’s investment company, Kopano ke Matla, was part of the e-tolls project when the federation was so opposed to the system.
Oliphant, who was invited to speak at the Midrand meeting, said there were too many unions and union federations.
“Our labour law was built on the foundation of strong trade unions. Quite frankly, this foundation has of late become very shaky with the proliferation of small and fragmented unions that are mushrooming all over the place,” she told delegates.
She said some Cosatu affiliates “allowed the proliferation of labour brokers in their industries” as part of their own bargaining agreements.
“They agree that labour brokers must continue, that the only thing that the employers must do is to inform the union that they are continuing,” Oliphant said without naming the unions, leading to gasps from delegates.
“But at the same time, in that particular agreement, the very same labour brokers” were instructed, she said to “pay skills levy for training of the shop steward to the union”.
Oliphant asked Cosatu to investigate its affiliates who allowed labour broking in their investment companies “because if you don’t do that, you will always have complaints that (the) government has not banned labour brokers while at the same time you are working together with those companies”.
She hit out at the investment companies, saying they caused divisions in unions as workers did not benefit much while the administration fees were sky high.
Oliphant said some of the divisions around misappropriation of investment companies had led to the emergence of rival unions, “often set up by the union officials of the same union they seek to destabilise”.
“This is a recipe for anarchy,” she said.
Oliphant was also unhappy that strikes were no longer a last resort of unions, but rather a “fashion statement for those with something to prove to rival unions”.
She said strikes lasted longer than was necessary.
Oliphant appealed to unions to do a cost benefit analysis to realise when it was time for mass action to end.
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