Minister of Employment and Labour Thulas Nxesi introduced the Compensation for Occupational Injuries and Diseases Amendment Bill in parliament on Thursday (10 September).<\/p>\n
According to an attached explanatory memorandum, the bill will make a number of amendments to the existing Compensation for Occupational Injuries & Diseases Act – including changes to the existing definition of an ’employee’ to include domestic workers.<\/p>\n
As it currently stands the Compensation for Occupational Injuries and Diseases Act states that workers are entitled to claim compensation under specific circumstances – however, this does not cover domestic workers and gardeners.<\/p>\n
In seeking compensation, domestic employees are currently only able to claim against the Unemployment Insurance Fund and perhaps make a civil claim against the employer.<\/p>\n
The new bill aims to change this by making the Act apply to domestic workers as well.<\/p>\n
The bill also wants to introduce regulations to address “the tendency of some employers to dismiss employees on the basis of occupational injuries or diseases,” Nxesi said.<\/p>\n
“Chapter VII(A) seeks to introduce the concept of a multi-disciplinary employee-based process of rehabilitation and reintegration of injured employees or employees who contracted occupational diseases,” the explanatory memorandum states.<\/p>\n
This means an employer will have to exhaust all rehabilitation and reintegration processes<\/strong> before laying off an employee, Nxesi said.<\/p>\n “Employers will be incentivised for full compliance with the provisions of this chapter by way of rebates on their annual assessments.”<\/p>\n You can read the full bill below.<\/p>\n