CCMA ruling underscores need for Parliamentary budget oversight

6 September 2016

The Commission for Conciliation, Mediation and Arbitration (CCMA) has dealt Secretary to Parliament, Mr Gengezi Mgidlana, a major blow after ruling that the legislature should pay researchers salary increases for the last four years, retrospectively. 

The failure to pay researchers in accordance with a pay scale agreement signed in 2011 but never implemented could cost as much as R38 million.

I will again appeal to the Speaker of Parliament to request that she instruct the Co-Chairpersons of the Joint Standing Committee on Financial Management of Parliament to schedule a meeting as a matter of urgency so that Mr Mgidlana can be called to explain.

The CCMA findings against Mr Mgidlana not only threatens Parliament’s budget and, possibly, the effective functioning of our legislature, it also undermines his ongoing engagement with disgruntled parliamentary staff.

Mr Mgidlana’s office finds itself at a protracted impasse with labour union Nehawu over performance bonuses. The CCMA ruling raises concerns over a repeat of the crippling strikes at Parliament which caused parliamentary sittings to be suspended at the end of 2015.

At a time when National Treasury is called upon to bail-out dysfunctional state-owned enterprises (SOEs), we cannot allow the very institution tasked with Executive oversight to join the begging line outside Treasury.

Issued by John Steenhuisen, Chief Whip of the Democratic Alliance, 6 September 2016