By: Amy Musgrave
The Democratic Alliance has undertaken to support SMMEs over the next five years by slashing red tape that holds small businesses back and reforming the country’s labour laws. The DA, which is a signatory to a multi-party Charter to build an alternative government, has seven apex priorities for 2024–2029 in its election manifesto.
They are:
- Creating two million jobs
- Ending load-shedding and water-shedding
- Halving the rate of violent crime
- Abolishing cadre deployment and building a capable state
- Lifting six million people out of poverty
- Tripling the number of Grade 4 learners who can read for meaning
- Ensuring quality healthcare, irrespective of economic status
On enhancing job creation, the country’s second-largest party says the collective bargaining system must change so that it is more representative of bargaining parties. However, SMMEs will be exempted from the administrative extension of bargaining council agreements. “This will be done by amending the Labour Relations Act so that small businesses do not have to participate in collective bargaining agreements. If parties are not signatories to collective wage agreements, they should not be subject to those agreements,” the manifesto reads.
“Collective agreements extended throughout an entire industry, including small businesses, compel these enterprises to implement the conditions contained in these agreements. This poses a financial challenge for small businesses as they struggle to match the economies of scale enjoyed by larger counterparts.” In addition, these deals often overlook the financial viability of smaller entities. By exempting SMMEs from this obligation, it will make it cheaper and easier for them to hire people, it says.
This is in line with the charter’s economic plan, which states that the SMME sector must be exempt from all labour legislation other than the Basic Conditions of Employment Act. Signatories want to introduce a broad range of regulatory exemptions for SMMEs for the first three years of operation to improve their rate of survival. The manifesto says that the economy cannot grow without controlling public finances, slashing red tape, and enhancing competition.
It plans to cut red tape for small businesses by accelerating the introduction of ‘One-Stop-Shops’ for SMMEs to reduce the time and cost of starting a business. It also wants to make it easier for informal traders to sell their goods and services by streamlining by-laws and regulations, expediting the licensing approval process, and assisting them to comply with health and safety standards.
Informal traders across South Africa are in a constant battle with municipalities to get permits and trade legally, including in the DA-run City of Cape Town. The city has set aside R56-million for informal trading developments and to introduce skills development programmes for traders and emerging entrepreneurs. The DA believes that it has demonstrated in the Western Cape and metros where it governs that it is able to turn its pledges into concrete actions that will deliver for all.
