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Skills Development Act
Proposed Skills Development Act amendments, comments due 31st January 2018
The minister of Higher Education published a proposal to change the Skills Development Act, comments due before the 31st of January 2018.
Some highlights of these amendments propose to:
The good:
1. Remove SETA regional offices and create one central sharing system/office to be more effective.
2. Sharing of resources, such as IT and HR.
3. SETAs to use one central shared database for all related tasks.
4. Reduce the SETA income from 10.5% to 10%.
5. Include Scarce and Critical Skills in the Discretionary criteria. (Whoop Whoop for employers.)
6. Replacement of the WSP/ATR in a more convenient reporting structure.
The bad:
1. Keep Mandatory grants at 20%
2. Keep Discretionary grants at 49.5%
Everyone can comment, either in their personal or business capacity. EACH RESPONSE HELP!
We prepared a brief document in the middle of the holidays and on short notice to help explain some of these proposals. We also prepared a word template that can be used/edited with your own comments to the minister before the 31st of January 2018. The views and comments on these documents are of our own and we welcome any other input and feedback on this topic.
Skills Development proposed amendments White Paper
Purpose of the Skills Development Act
Purpose of the Skills Development Act (1998)
The stated purpose of the Skills Development Act (SDA) 1998 is:
a) to develop the skills of the South African workforce
i to improve the quality of life of workers, their prospects of work and labour mobility
ii to improve productivity in the workplace and the competitiveness of employers
iii to promote self-employment; and
iv to improve the delivery of social services
b) to increase the levels of investment in education and training in the labour market and to improve the return on that investment
c) to encourage employers
i to use the workplace as an active learning environment
ii to provide employees with the opportunities to acquire new skills
iii to provide opportunities for new entrants to the labour market to gain work experience;
and
iv to employ persons who find it difficult to be employed
d) to encourage workers to participate in learnerships and other training programmes
e) to improve the employment prospects of persons previously disadvantaged by unfair discrimination and to redress those disadvantages through training and education
f) to ensure the quality of education and training in and for the workplace g) to assist
i work-seekers to find work
ii retrenched workers to re-enter the labour market
iii employers to find qualified employees; and
iv to provide and regulate employment services.