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The Department of Employment and Labor says it has plans to move forward with amendments to the Compensation for Occupational Injury and Illness Act (Coida), which will include the labor rights of domestic workers in South Africa.
In a presentation to parliament on Wednesday (November 4), the department said it plans to amend section 1 of the law to change the definition of ’employee’ to include these workers.
La Coida compensates employees for disabilities caused by occupational injuries or illnesses suffered or contracted in the course of their employment, or for death resulting from such injuries or illnesses.
In its current form, the Coida expressly excludes domestic workers for purposes of the law, but the labor department is pushing hard for this to change.
“To eliminate such discrimination, the bill eliminates the express exclusion of domestic workers as employees. This is in accordance with international labor standards, ”the department said in its presentation.
“Both the domestic employer and the employees will be required to register as such, respectively, in accordance with the provisions of the law.”
Currently, registered employers are required to submit an income return form annually in terms of the law.
The amendment follows a series of court decisions. Last year in May, the Pretoria High Court ruled that the exclusion of domestic workers from the law was unconstitutional and invalid. Ground reported.
This ruling follows a court case brought by Sylvia Mahlangu, the daughter of a domestic worker, Maria Mahlangu, who drowned at her employer’s home in 2012, and the SADSAWU union.
In October last year, the same court ruled that the inclusion of Coida coverage for domestic workers should apply retroactively to domestic workers who were injured or died while working prior to the grant of the May order. 2019.
The bill also wants to introduce regulations to address “the tendency of some employers to fire employees on the basis of occupational injuries or illnesses.”
“Chapter VII (A) seeks to introduce the concept of a multidisciplinary process for the rehabilitation and reintegration of injured employees or employees who contracted occupational diseases,” the explanatory memorandum reads.
This means that an employer will have to exhaust all the rehabilitation and reintegration processes before laying off an employee.
Read: A major court ruling has gone against BEE in South Africa, but will not change existing rules, authorities say.
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