1. 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

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

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

4. 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

5. 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

6. 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

7. 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

8. 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

9. 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

10. 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

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

12. 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

13. 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

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

15. 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

16. 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