Pretoria – The Department of Labour is to conduct hearings in the garden and landscaping services sector to explore extending the sectorial determination.
The hearings are scheduled to run from Wednesday through to 17 October.
The garden and landscaping services sector includes activities such as digging, raking, mowing, spreading, mixing, watering, trimming hedges, weeding, felling or removing trees or other vegetation or planting under supervision.
The focus of the hearings will be to engage both employers and workers on the categories of workers to be covered by the sectoral determination and the factors to be taken into consideration when setting minimum wages.
The hearings will also debate the mechanism to be utilised for setting minimum wages and annual increases, including the level at which minimum wages should be pegged and any other conditions related to the operation within the sector.
The first hearings – on Wednesday – will take place at the Klerksdorp Civic Centre in the North West and at Pretoria North’s Sport and Recreational Hall in Gauteng.
Others will take place in Emalahleni in Mpumalanga and Port Elizabeth in the Eastern Cape.
All the public hearings are scheduled to start at 10am.
The garden and landscaping services sector currently has no sectoral determination. Most of the employers in sector complies with the Basic Conditions of Employment Act (BCEA).
Following the go-ahead by Labour Minister, Mildred Oliphant, a notice was published in the Government Gazette on the 11th April 2014 inviting interested parties to make written representations to the department.
A written submission has been received from South African Landscaping Institute (SALI).
The public hearings will give more stakeholders a say in the process. – SAnews.gov.za
