aAnna Majavu

aAnna Majavu

Labour Minister Membathisi Mdladlana says the ANC will "ban labour brokers after it wins next year's election".

Mdladlana was speaking to a small group of Langa residents on Saturday while campaigning for the ANC in this week's by-election to elect a ward councillor.

"A vote for the ANC means exactly that," he said.

"Labour brokers are not doing our workers a service.

"People who are employed by labour brokers have no pensions, no benefits - in the end they are just dumped," he said.

Mdladlana said "the better option" was that the government deal with the labour brokers because they had the power to do so. "We must deal with this issue of labour brokers," he said.

Cosatu spokesman Patrick Craven praised Mdladlana's suggestion and said "labour broking is a form of human trafficking".

"Labour brokers collect huge pools of workers and then sell them at the lowest possible wages to the lowest bidder," he said.

"They also reduce wages overall in the country because employers can pick and choose workers for the lowest price."

Mdladlana told Sowetan that there was no place for labour brokers in a "harmonised labour market" that sought to put the interests of the people first.

He said labour brokers had already been successfully banned in Namibia.

Craven said recruitment agencies, which advertise vacancies but don't employ people like labour brokers do, were unlikely to be affected by any ban on labour brokers.