Employment equity document disappointing and superficial

THE 14th report of the Commission for Employments Equity is a disappointing and superficial document that will do little to promote the real development of the country's human resources, says the Cape Chamber of Commerce and Industry.

"We want to see employment equity in the workplace and in management but to achieve this we need to foster and develop the talents of our people. The intention and spirit of employment equity is not simply to look at racial quotas of top-paying jobs, but to look at how we can develop our human resources as a nation," said Ms Janine Myburgh, president of the Chamber.

The Chamber had the impression that the commission was looking at the wrong things. "What we should really be looking at is the future and how to bring on and develop the next generation of managers."

The report itself was sloppy and was not properly checked. This could be seen in the "highlights" which contained two versions of the same paragraph while another paragraph was repeated.

It also chose to compare figures for the number of managers in different race groups and genders with the figures for 2003. If it had made the comparison with last year's figures a completely different picture would have emerged and 2013 would have been seen as the year when things went backwards. In virtually all categories the figures for 2013 were worse than those for 2012 but there is no explanation for this significant difference. Instead the new report simply ignores the findings of its own previous report.

"Clearly something is wrong but the commission seems to be more concerned about race and numbers rather than trying to understand what is happening in the work place," Ms Myburgh said.

She pointed out that the report of the government's Ministerial Task Team in March, 2012 had found that not a single SETA could demonstrate an improvement in economic performance in their sector resulting from their interventions and that it could be argued that the entire system should be dismantled.

"Skills development in this country is a massive failure and that is probably our biggest problem. It is time to stop thinking in quotas and deal with the real issues."

One explanation for the poor quality of the report was the inappropriate qualifications of the commissioners. Business was clearly under represented and the commission was dominated by trade unionists, social workers and politicians. Both community representatives, for instance, were high profile members of the SACP.

"When you look at the commissioners and their backgrounds it becomes clear that business was either not heard or understood. This is supposed to be a report about what is happening in business but there is no commissioner with a background in human resource management managing a business," Ms Myburgh said.

Statement issued by Janine Myburgh Cape Chamber of Commerce and Industry, April 15 2014

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