Workers’ unions in the steel and engineering industries have gone back to the drawing board to ruminate on the employers’ wage offer in a bid to avert potential industrial action as the current three-year agreement expires on June 30.
This comes after representatives from the metal and engineering industries convened for the second round of wage negotiations on Wednesday, under the auspices of the Metal and Engineering Industries Bargaining Council (MEIBC).
Among the employer associations that are participating in the wage talks are the Consolidated Employers Organisation (CEO), National Employers’ Associations of South Africa (Neasa), SA Engineers and Founders Association (Saefa), SAUEO and the Steel and Engineering Industries Federation of South Africa (Seifsa).
Unions are demanding the extension of the current wage agreement, with an improvement of 1%, which is to be added to the 6% of the first year of the existing agreement.
This means a 7% wage increment for the first year, and 6% for the 2nd and 3rd year.
However, the employers’ wage offer ranges between 6% for the lowest level employees and 5% for skilled employees.
Additionally, the offer is tied to the minimum rates of pay per job category, and not based on the actual wages earned by employees.
Trade union Solidarity has rejected the wage offer presented by the various employer organisations outright, and described it as “deceptive”.
Solidarity’s general secretary Gideon du Plessis said that to base increases on minimum rates of pay would result in the skilled and experienced employees receiving an increase well below inflation, whereas entry level employees would receive above inflation increases.
Du Plessis pressed the employer organisations to review their wage increase offer and base it on the actual wage rates, as was the case until 2021, and to not further disadvantage skilled employees.
He said the metal and engineering sectors operate under a collective bargaining agreement, which includes technical schedules defining minimum wage rates across various occupations, ranges from highly-skilled artisans (Grade A) to unskilled workers (Grade H).
“To illustrate the implications of this scenario, one can refer to the fact that the actual pay rate for a Grade A artisan is on average R200 per hour, while the prevailing collective agreement mandates a minimum pay rate of R98.11 for entry-level artisans.
“The 5% increase is then based on the minimum rates, and as a result, the entry level artisan will receive the 5% increase that relates to an increase of R4.91 per hour, whilst the top level artisan's real wage increase amounts to only 2.4% based on the R4.91 per hour increase.
“The compounding effect of this arrangement is unsustainable both at an individual level and at an industry level.
“Solidarity, therefore, firmly opposes the continuation of basing increases on the minimum wage rates to the detriment of employees possessing scarce skills.”
The steel sector is the backbone of South Africa’s industrial base, with every other major sector – from mining, to auto, to construction – depending on it.
According to the National Union of Metalworkers of South Africa (Numsa), the lowest paid worker is earning R59.10 per hour in this industry.
Numsa is demanding that employers pay these increases on the actual rates of pay, saying its position was justified by the negative impact of inflationary pressures on workers’ wages.
Numsa’s national spokesperson Phakamile Hlubi-Majola yesterday said they had “a robust engagement” with employers during the meeting on Wednesday night.
Hlubi-Majola, however, did not want to go into the details of the engagement as the unions and employers were still trying to find one another.
“We have not yet found one another. So we do have another round of wage talks which is scheduled for May 8. And we hope that we will be closer to one another by May 8. We really are hopeful and we do hope to resolve these wage talks within the three rounds. We really would like to see that happen,” she said.
“As a trade union, it is not our goal to resort to strike action. Strikes are very painful, especially for workers themselves. As I said, the engagements were robust. You could see an attempt was being made to try and meet each other. But we are not at the point where we can say we've settled. We are still engaging.”
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