A 2020 Constitutional Court judgment emphasised that “a comprehensive social security, particularly for the most vulnerable members of society” is a cornerstone of any young democracy.
Maria Mahlangu died at her employers’ home in 2012, drowning in a pool while her boss of 22 years “heard no sounds of a struggle” while in the leisurely abode of her home.
Were it you or me, our kith and kin would not be seen to be doing anything out of the ordinary were they to request compensation on our passing — as Maria’s daughter, Sylvia, subsequently did. What she uncovered in her quest was that for all our progressive labour legislation, domestic workers, in the event of injury or death, would not be in a position to claim from the Compensation for Occupational Injuries and Disease Act (Coida) for injury or death at work.
The court was charged with considering the constitutionality of section 1(xix)(v) of the act, which excludes domestic workers from the definition of an “employee” — much like how other acts during apartheid, until the late 1970s, did not see black workers as “employees” deserving of rights to organisation and social security. The court found the exclusion constitutionally invalid and allowed for the inclusion of domestic workers in Coida to apply retrospectively from 1994. In so doing, many had hoped this would open avenues for those who have been hurt or died in private homes across the country to claim justice.
It now seems regulatory limitations, as compensation commissioner Vuyo Mafata suggested to us on MetroFMTalk last week, complicate the picture somewhat. Considerable responsibility rests on employers registering their employees, and retrospective claims rely on proof of employment.
The track record of these registrations has been dismal. “To date, there have been only about 120 employers that have registered their employees,” said Mafata. And you might be asking with those registration numbers how many Coida claims have been submitted? “[Outside of the claim of Ms Mahlangu], we have not had any other claim,” the commissioner said. This is a sad indictment on the process, nearly eight months after the judgment.
The case, and the subsequent administration of processes associated with its outcome, provide a few lessons on the history and future of work, and the role of social security. First, despite considerable advances, sectors where women are over-represented suffer not only from low wages, but weak bargaining power and trade union penetration. The national minimum wage of R19.09 an hour, well below the R21.69 national minimum, recognises the very low base from which domestic sector wages have emerged from, with historically lower ministerial determinations.
In recognition of this, the National Minimum Wage Commission, in its new determination, shifted this wage from 75% to 88% of the national minimum, and one expects that in the next few years equalisation will occur.
Second, the design of administrative processes needs to recognise that the low wages domestic workers earn are highly unlikely in our spatial apartheid to locate them in areas where they have high-speed internet to fill out a digital application. Nor is it likely that those 850,000 or so workers who remain employed in our homes will make the trip to the labour centre a priority on “Sheila’s Day” (a colloquial term for a domestic worker’s day off).
This then presents an opportunity for young people, this Youth Month through to Women’s Month in August, to share the gift of their time, to dedicate it to the mass registration of workers working in our homes.
On the 65th anniversary of the march by 20,000 SA women to the Union Buildings, we ought to rededicate ourselves to the plight of the most vulnerable.
• Cawe (@aycawe), a development economist, is MD of Xesibe Holdings and hosts MetroFMTalk on Metro FM.
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