Publications
Partners
Labour trade union federation Cosatu has cited the failure by workers to help their children with homework as the reason it is demanding a 40-hour working week.
Cosatu, which represents about 1.6 million workers, launched its campaign for the introduction of an economy wide 40-hour working week in Braamfontein, Johannesburg, today.
Cosatu general-secretary Bheki Ntshalintshali said the 40-hour work was not a new demand.
“We discussed it in 1995 when we introduced the basic conditions of employment act. In that context we have given our government and employers enough time to consider the 40 hour week.”
He said workers work long hours; travel during the night; leave their homes at 3 am when the kids are asleep; come back when the kids are asleep.
“They are not able to contribute to the social needs of their family. They can’t help their children with homework. We said now that we want workers to go back to the 8 hour working day, 8 hours of family and 8 hours to sleep. We believe that the research is on our side.”
Ntshalintshali said the world is moving towards a third hour week.
“If you look to Germany, Italy and France there are countries that are already working 35-hours a week or less 7-hours per day. They are highly productive because you don’t work until you are totally exhausted.”
The move by Cosatu is likely to be rejected by employers.
As Ntshalintshali puts it: “We know that this is not going to be easy. We know that employers will come up with different tricks.”
Cosatu president Zingiswa Losi said the federation was waiting for President Cyril Ramaphosa to declare non-trading hours and ensure that workers who don’t work on the paid public working holidays don’t face the repercussion from their employers.
“Our struggles are not just mere struggles but are informed also from what we have long fought for even before the liberation. We are also saying as a federation in 1886 workers came together demanding an end to slavery wages. And this is how a national May Day came to being. One of the issues that workers have demanded is the issue of a living wage,” she said.
However, Losi said the federation was happy that a national minimum wage bill has been signed into law.
“We are happy today through Cosatu that we have a national minimum wage. We have further said that we refuse to work under dangerous working conditions. You would recall in the mining sector there are workers who have said they are going to refuse where it was not safe and others have lost their lives because they have acceded to work in dangerous conditions,” Losi said.
Last year, Ramaphosa signed the national minimum wage bill which would benefit workers who currently earn below R3,700 a month.
