Cape Town - Employment and Labour Minister Nomakhosazana Meth says her department is making inroads in verifying COVID-TERS relief scheme payments to 215 companies.

Briefing the media yesterday on her first 100 days since taking office, Meth said Phase 3 of her department’s “Follow the Money” project commenced at the start of October.

The briefing took place with members of the Portfolio Committee on Employment and Labour and trade union representatives at the Cape Town Labour Centre, yesterday. During the Covid-19 pandemic, R65 billion rand was made available as a temporary relief for employers/employees.

The project aims to verify the payment of R65 bn to 215 companies under the COVID-TERS relief scheme.

“To date, the project has recovered R1.2 bn since starting. Initially, the aim was to verify 50% of the amount paid, and now we want to verify the entire amount. Consequently, 27 audit firms have been appointed, and phase 3 commenced in October.”

Meth said 96 fraud cases were identified, 40 were presented to the court, and all were finalised with the highest conviction set at 20 years direct imprisonment. Meth said the department will ensure compliance with the national minimum wage, as undocumented foreign nationals are abused in the process of labour exploitation. Inspector General Aggy Moiloa said: “For the financial year 2023/2024 audited, we did more than 16500 inspections just to test compliance with the national minimum wage and to that effect and we also enforced an amount of over R102 million and I’m talking money that was paid back to the employees out there that were being underpaid.”

Meth said in the next two weeks, the department would be taking the National Labour Migration Policy (NLMP) legislation to Cabinet which seeks to better regulate the migrant labour system in South Africa.

Inspections were conducted with the Department of Home Affairs, the Department of Transport, the South African Police Service, the Hawks, and the Bargaining Council of the Hospitality Sector. These inspections have resulted in the arrest of 81 employers as well as undocumented immigrants, Meth said.

During the first 100 days, 17662 national inspections were conducted and of these, 12195 workplaces were compliant while 5 494 workplaces were found to be non-compliant and enforcement notices were issued.

The total value of the notices were R24 266758. During this period, the department also announced an increase in the budget for the Temporary Employer-Employee Relief Scheme (TERS) from R400 million to R2.4 bn for the current financial year. Cosatu Western Cape provincial secretary Malvern de Bruyn said: “I'm disappointed in what I’ve heard today. That's not real, tangible issues that she briefed us on… For me, this was a time wasting exercise.”

The full report is available on the Employment and Labour website (www.labour.gov.za).

shakirah.thebus@inl.co.za

Cape Argus