Metals Industry strike - my take

[tec0]

identifying possible win/win solutions

Now in my completely uneducated and laymen mindset I would imagine a win win is where both parties can operate safely be profitable and contribute to a stronger healthier economy. Thus allowing for a strong foundation towards health, security, job security and above all Education.

This can be established by reassigning responsibility towards both the employer and employee and re-establish the union’s role and responsibility towards both the employee and the employer.

Have open communications, establish what is and what is not within reason and rework the bylaw structure to allow for more decisive disciplinary actions and if needed planned legal action against bad employers. Thus both parties will be actively taking responsibility more seriously as both can be held accountable.

The biggest problem right is we lack communication and a infrastructure as well as a proper custodian.

In other to function you need to make the basics work first before everything else can work.

my 2 cents...

peace

[desA]

Justloadit commented:
I speak from my own circumstance, I have placed all my savings of the last 10 years, into the business during the last 3 years, there is nothing left to prop the business up if there is another huge loss, I would rather shut the door than to risk my family's well being. Interestingly, I have been offered employment with remuneration which is more than 3 times what I get out of my business right now.

I have spoken to a number of other entrepreneurs who are in similar business circumstances, where they have also invested all their savings to maintain the status quo. Very difficult times in deed. Whats holding me back is that some one else will tell me what I have to do every day, not something I will take on easily, having been a free spirit for so long, but the sentiment could change very quickly if the circumstances begin to lean the wrong way.

Wealth re-distribution.

You are left to start again, while others have profited from you & your family's efforts.

Is this fair?

[adrianh]

Wealth re-distribution.

You are left to start again, while others have profited from you & your family's efforts.

Is this fair?

Isn't that the exact argument that black people have in this country. The kids were forced to stay with the grandmother while the father was forced to be a migrant worker on the mine and the mother a migrant worker maid?

The only difference is that the shoe is on the other foot.

And yes, many many businesses are going to close their doors and many people are going to emigrate and at the end of it all life isn't fair, but it never was and it never will be!

[Dave A]

Now in my completely uneducated and laymen mindset I would imagine a win win is where both parties can operate safely be profitable and contribute to a stronger healthier economy. Thus allowing for a strong foundation towards health, security, job security and above all Education.

This can be established by reassigning responsibility towards both the employer and employee and re-establish the union’s role and responsibility towards both the employee and the employer.

I hear you, and we might have actually been heading towards a situation something like that.

However, throw in a situation as we're in now with rival unions competing for members and influence - How can they compete without disrupting this fairly workable scenario?

[tec0]

I hear you, and we might have actually been heading towards a situation something like that.

However, throw in a situation as we're in now with rival unions competing for members and influence - How can they compete without disrupting this fairly workable scenario?

I don't know I something just doesn't feel right about our current standing. It feels well it feels WRONG. Look I know anger can get the best of all of us at some point but at some point one must identify the "driver" of the problem and in doing so it becomes clear that the problem is really easy to solve but the "driver" is trying its best to be unreasonable and to a large degree antisocial and is actively polarizing masses to take part in mass action.

What we are seeing now is a political agenda. It is like the maid from hell scenario as seen on this thread. It is engineered to be insolvable and maintain the argument. So what can we do as employers and employees?

the real answer is nothing... there is really nothing we can do as shown on the news. Intimidation seems to be an active strategy... and it is not within the letter of the law.

But time will tell the truth it always do...

[desA]

I would be interested in anecdotal reports from Kenya, Nigeria, Zimbabwe, other African nations, post change/emergence. What happened to the businesses of the day?

Answers to these questions may prove useful to business operators in the present/changing SA.

[IanF]

CEO of Invicta Holdings, Arnold Goldstone spoke to Alec Hogg about uncertainty in SA’s industrial sector and the impact that it is having on Invicta, its shareholders and its future prospects. Arnold provided some sobering words for South Africa, its leadership, and its unions. If there is one thing that you should watch today, it is this interview. The facts regarding labour unrest, instability and ever rising wage demands are simple – SA is trying to compete globally. If a company’s shareholders will be better served by the company investing elsewhere then it is certain to do that. Business will take their investment elsewhere, as will international investors. South Africa’s manufacturing industry has the potential to be a competitive value adder internationally, but is being handicapped by all the striking. Something has got to give. – LF

Link here

Here is a big company which will start moving the factories out of SA because of the lawlessness of the trade unions. Is this the end goal of the unions that they are in self destruct mode.

How do we get over this anger of the workers that unions are exploiting for their own narrow purposes.

[Dave A]

So what can we do as employers and employees?

the real answer is nothing...

Sorry, but that's not acceptable.

We have to do something. We cannot afford to just accept the situation.
And the first step is to mobilise thinking by communicating...

As Justloadit points out, there are lots of businesses on the edge. Not only does that place the owners and everything they own in jeopardy, it also means jobs are in jeopardy too. And it's not just SME's in this boat. Just off the top of my head:

• Lonmin was pretty fragile before the first AMCU strike, let alone the second one. They must be really sorely stretched now.
• Amplats is disinvesting.
• BMW has decided not to invest in anything new in SA.

And I'm sure there's lots more if one starts digging.

The signs of a fundamental problem is also reflected in our GDP performance. While many emerging economies are achieving 5% and more annual GDP growth, we're at a dismal 1.5% or so, and that number just keeps heading the wrong way too.

The writing is on the wall, and something has to be done to mobilise a change in direction. And NOW!

To my mind, one thing we definitely need is an extra step in the LRA's "process to strike or lockout". I don't know exactly what that extra step should be just yet (any suggestions?), but taking the road to hell is just far too easy right now.

[Justloadit]

On 702 this morning, there was an interview with ?Trudi? something, apparently 25% of unemployment worse than previous stats of 2008 - 5million unemployed, and out of that 3 million youngsters. What was being said was something about dropping entry level wages, which will fly against the union demands. To match new job entrants every year, a typical growth rate of 5.5% is needed. We are very far from that at 1.5% and declining.

Once any institution starts dabbling into what business must and must not do is the beginning of the end of that business. Business survives because it can offer a better service at a better price, labour should be in the same lines. Instituting minimum wages and the likes simply derails the system. There is always dangers when there is no control, but in this instance there is over control. Too much control stifles growth, and that is precisely what is happening.

[desA]

Invicta/BMG already obtain most of their products from abroad. The engineered products division of BMG is fairly small in terms of total group turnover.

Goldstone's comment has little real impact on present SA manufacturing. He'll be using this as an excuse for a raft of poor trading results, I'd imagine.

The real impact of the strikes is that Invicta/BMG's customer base is eroding, as the mines begin going out of business.

[desA]

ARNOLD GOLDSTONE: Well, Alec, you know a few years ago, we looked at the market in South Africa, and we nominated that South Africa was slowly de-industrialising and I was taken to task at the time – it was about three years ago – but that was our perception. We could notice a pervasive lack of competitiveness in the market. At the end of the day, we are competing with the rest of the world, whatever we manufacture in South Africa, so it became obvious to us that South Africa didn’t have the environment that would encourage competitive manufacturing, so we started looking abroad. We’ve publically stated we would like 50 percent of our income to be, generated from non-South African sources within five years. We are currently at about 22 percent of our revenue, coming from abroad, so we are fishing in international waters for the diversification that we want outside of South Africa.

Also, Invicta’s market is fairly limited in the country because we are relatively large, in whichever industry we operate in, which makes it difficult to make game changing acquisitions in our industries. There are competition commission restrictions that would prevent us from making the game changes here, so we embarked on this path some years ago. Perhaps a bit prophetic, sad for the country, unfortunately that we have a big industry, like the manufacturing industry, which is on a slow decline, so as a South African, it is very sad for me to be an observer.

An interesting perspective. Erosion of local purchasing power, combined with a de-industrialing society, is driving Invicta/BMG abroad.

[Faan]

In my opinion the future lies in small business. I am not convinced that there is much one can do about the present situation except at the polling station and I think we all know how that works. This however does not mean you have to stay away. Rather talk to the people working or reporting to you to go and vote when the opportunity arises.

We can complain as much as we like about what the unions are doing, but as an individual there is nothing you can do

By supporting small businesses we can grow the economy. We have to support each other. If at all possible buy from each other and if you do buy do not argue about a few cents in price and please pay. Do not get the seller to beg you for his money. Many people in good positions will at some point in the future be retrenched and that should not be the end of a career but the beginning of a new life. Help each other to find an opportunity.

The chances that you will be doing something on your own in a new business are minute and this will allow you to employ 1 or 2 or more people and in doing so create jobs and grow the economy.

On the forum we probably have a few people in the corporate world. I would advise them to start looking around for opportunities and if you are passionate about something investigate the possibility of creating a business out of it. I am a member of BNI and quite a number of the people in our chapter has been forced into doing something new and they are all successful in their businesses.

None of us in the forum will be able to do something about the union(s). Let us not put our energy into the unions, but rather on providing a better and more effective service or product to our customers.

[desA]

Time to form the "Formerly Advantaged, Now Totally Disadvantaged, Union"?

FANTDU

[Chatmaster]

Hi Guys

I have to agree with so many posts on here. It is completely crazy. I had a look at the way Africa in general is heading and where SA is sitting in that picture, and in my mind there is no doubt that we are heading where most of Africa has been already. The real problem here is that the entire picture is wrong. From the challenging prospect of just starting a business that can take months to the power that the unions have been given through legislation and political alliances. We need a complete review.

[IanF]

Where to start.
At the top but realistically there is no chance that with our current ANC, maybe if Cyril Ramaphosa becomes president then yes.

From what I understand there is no secret ballot for a strike vote Letter to Bday unions use tyranny once this happens then the power of the thugs is reduced.

Then we need to get the employees to have something worth losing so they want to protect it. That is get them into a middle class mindset. How business does this is the hard part for us.

Anyway my 5cents.