SA not a friendly place for SMEs: DA
The Democratic Alliance (DA) says that national government imposed regulations continue to remain the biggest hindrance to the launch of new businesses and job creation in South Africa.
The Department of Trade and Industry’s (DTI) on Wednesday, launched guidelines to reduce red tape in municipalities for Small Medium and Micro-Sized Enterprises (SMMEs).
Geordin Hill-Lewis, DA shadow deputy minister of Trade and Industry said that the DTI’s initiative is a welcome step towards removing some of the devastating red-tape which is killing small businesses and undermining job creation.
However, he said that the minister of Trade and Industry, Rob Davies “should lead by example if he is serious about this fight against red tape and announce measures at national level – where he has the powers to do so – to ensure that it is easier for small businesses to start up, grow and employ South Africans”.
the DA lead pointed to the National Development Plan’s proposal of setting up an expert panel for across-the-board regulatory review for SMMEs.
“I will be submitting parliamentary questions to Minister Davies to ascertain why he has not yet set up such a panel, whether he intends on doing so, and if not, why he continues allowing red-tape to kill jobs in South Africa.
“Unfortunately, instead of seeking to reduce red-tape in his own Department Minister Davies seems hell-bent on increasing the burden of government regulation on small and start-up businesses through the introduction of the Businesses Licensing Bill – a job-killing ‘Red-tape bill’,” he said.
The DA said it would call for the permanent scrapping of the “Red-tape bill”.
“South Africa is not a friendly place for small business,” Hill-Lewis said, pointing to a World Economic Forum’s Africa Competitiveness Report, which ranked South Africa 37th out of 38 African countries on the burden of government regulation measure.
SA was also ranked 53rd out of 185 economies in terms of the ease of starting a business by the World Bank’s Doing Business 2013 Report, ten positions lower than the country’s ranking in 2012.
Reducing red-tape in municipalities is possible, the DA said, highlighting its own position in Cape Town where it says it has successfully reduced the 1,507 pages of regulations on planning applications to 185 and repealed 286 obsolete land-use management policies.
“Local governments, however, can only do so much. National government imposed regulations continue to remain the biggest hindrance to the launch of new businesses and job creation,” Hill-Lewis said.
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