Joint CIB W099 & TG59 Conference 11-13 June 2017 Cape Town, South Africa CASUALIZATION OF WORK IN CONSTRUCTION AND THE PLIGHT OF WORKERS IN BLOEMFONTEIN LG Mollo1 & FA Emuze2 1.2Department of Built Environment – CUT

Content Research Background Problem Statement Research Methodology Findings and Discussion Conclusion Acknowledgement

Background – 1 Most unemployed people choose to fight poverty and inequality by becoming casual construction workers Figure 1: Casual Workers L. Mollo & F. Emuze

Background – 2 Casualization in the construction industry is influenced by unemployment or lack of decent jobs Casualization is described as the process of employing people either on a daily, weekly or monthly basis for an undefined task or specified job without issuing a permanent contract L. Mollo & F. Emuze

Background – 3 Casualization is adopted in the industries where demands for employment is highly variable and where entrepreneurs often like to employ people temporary positions: Construction work Port work Farm labour Other jobs which require manual labour or unskilled workers L. Mollo & F. Emuze

Problem Statement Problem Statement: Casualization keeps on growing as the dilemma and little is done to eradicate it in the South African construction industry, despite the existence of institutions such as the Department of Labour in South Africa that governs the labor practice through constituted Employment Acts L. Mollo & F. Emuze

Research Question Research Question: What does it mean to be a casual construction worker in Bloemfontein We see casual workers daily in Bloemfontein L. Mollo & F. Emuze

Research Method Qualitative To understand the range of social issues such as the behavior or the reason for being a casual worker in Bloemfontein Semi-structured interviews: 18 participants Aged between 25 and 35 years old 72% (13) = Youth 28% (5) = Older Men Race = Black Male No Female L. Mollo & F. Emuze

Findings – 1 Casual Worker’s Definition: The procedures of seeking employment by standing by the side of the road (traffic robot) in town to seek any hard manual labour job Reason for becoming a casual worker Inadequate work opportunities Poor education background or no education Economic recession (2008) – a major problem Now, we are in a technical recession L. Mollo & F. Emuze

Findings – 2 Challenges experienced by casual workers Poor or late payments of wages Oppressors (bullies) Getting employment Standing at the side of the street Cellphone contact L. Mollo & F. Emuze

Findings – 3 Figure 2: Advertisement Board L. Mollo & F. Emuze

Findings – 4 Personal Protective Equipment (PPE) and Site Induction No PPE (safety clothes, shoes, cloves, reflectors) Site induction does not take place, below are quotes from one participant ‘In 2016, I was taken to a construction site in Kimberly to work for three days, and I never heard of the word site induction, what is site induction and how does it help me’ L. Mollo & F. Emuze

Discussion – 1 The textual data and the literature reviewed show that there are links between the factors that are pervasive regarding casualization in the construction industry The Model below attempts to bring the factors together L. Mollo & F. Emuze

Figure 3: Casual Worker Frame Model (Mollo & Emuze, 2017)

Conclusions The study provides insights about the rationale for the proliferation of the numbers of casual workers in Bloemfontein Both the private and public sectors are failing to produce permanent jobs Casualization is a negation of the decent job concept and the notion of Respect for People The Department of Labour in South Africa must tackle casualization and compel people using casual worker to pay them a fair standard hourly rate L. Mollo & F. Emuze

Acknowledgement Thank You! The researcher acknowledges the financial support of the National Research Foundation – Thuthuka Funding Instrument and The Unit for Lean Construction and Sustainability Thank You! L. Mollo & F. Emuze