Johannesburg - Hundreds of Cosatu members were expected to protest outside the high court in Pretoria on Monday morning, where a case challenging critical provisions of the labour laws will be heard.
The Free Market Foundation (FMF) wants the court to amend Section 32 of the Labour Relations Act, which gives the minister of labour the power to extend collective bargaining agreements to non-parties.
The organisation has argued that employers’ inability to set workers' wages as they see fit has hampered job creation in the country.
It wanted only companies which are members of collective bargaining councils in the country to be subjected to agreements reached with unions in those forums.
Cosatu in Gauteng has described the move by the foundation as an attempt to create a two-tier labour system that seeks to exploit workers.
The federation’s provincial secretary, Dumisani Dakile, said their fight against the court challenge, which was first launched three years ago, was to protect current and future workers from exploitation by bosses.
“They have not submitted any evidence that extending bargaining council agreements will lead to job losses.
“They (FMF) are trying to create a two-tier labour system by saying that every single employer must be able to decide, as an individual, which wages they want to pay,” said Dakile.
Cosatu, the National Union of Metalworkers and 23 collective bargaining councils have joined the labour minister as respondents in the matter.
The FMF stated in its heads of argument to the court that their fundamental objection to the provisions was that”the principle of majoritarianism can never sensibly be invoked to justify a system in which private actors determine the fate of those who have not voluntarily subscribed to the process”.
They further contend that such an allowance is unconstitutional as it impedes the minister’s “general discretion to act in the public interest”
Constitutional law expert Professor Pierre de Vos wrote on his website column, when the matter was first launched in 2013, that the FMF “had a lot of money to waste”, describing their bid as a “frivolous argument”.
He said the foundation was not making constitutional arguments but was rather “aggrieved by the policy choices made by the legislature aimed at protecting collective bargaining agreements, as well as those workers not immediately bound by such agreements”.
Yesterday, the DA's Joburg mayoral candidate, Herman Mashaba, who is also a former chairman of the foundation, said their legal challenge was a “beacon of hope for the 8.3 million unemployed South Africans”.
He accused those opposing the matter of politicising the case.
“Although I am no longer involved with the case, I am proud to have initiated and underwritten and led the labour law challenge through three years of delays, intimidation, demonstrations, and threats that blood will run in the streets if the court rules in favour of the FMF and the unemployed,” said Mashaba.
In court papers filed in response to the foundation’s assertions, Labour Minister Mildred Oliphant dismissed the organisation's understanding and interpretation of the disputed sections of the law.
“The FMF seeks to characterise the minister’s Section 32 (2) power to extend collective agreements as a mere tick-box exercise that does not give the minister any meaningful discretion or control over the extension process.
“This is incorrect,” she said.
“In its attack on the process entailed in the act, the FMF has accused the minister of refusing to think.”
The foundation said it would pursue the matter all the way to the Constitutional Court if need be, it said.
THE STAR