Congress of South African Trade Unions (Cosatu) has expressed its support for the Private Member’s Bill that aims to end the outsourcing of essential government services.

The insourcing Bill, if passed, will require state entities to employ workers to provide regularly required services such as security, cleaning, maintenance and IT, among other functions.

Where this is not possible, state organs will have to seek authorisation for an exemption.

Cosatu Parliamentary Coordinator Matthew Parks says the measure will eliminate corruption in tender processes, end worker exploitation and promote accountability in service delivery.

Parks says, “Outsourcing has really become the kind of epicentre of corruption and state capture across the state, and unless we deal with it then we can’t continue to be surprised when we see headlines about which politician, which family member, which business man got some overly inflated tender and then failed to deliver on those services, and again that speaks to saving money for the state.”

He says, “It also speaks to re-capacitating the state to provide basic services. I mean, we all know how badly weakened the services have become over the past few decades. So, I think for us it’s a positive thing.”

Parks also says the labour federation will mobilise its full support to accelerate the Bill’s approval by Parliament and that President Cyril Ramaphosa signs it into law.

He says, “For us, what’s critical is to get the support of the ANC (African National Congress). It does speak to the ANC’s own resolutions for the past decade, where the ANC had said they’re committed to insourcing for the same reasons. So, there will need to be discussions with members of the GNU (Government of National Unity), with members from parties outside the GNU, but I think for us, we think most political parties would support this.”

PODCAST | Interview with Parks on SAFM’s The Morning Brief programme: