Effects of Domestic Workers Act in South Africa: A steep road to recognition

Abstract

abstract Although domestic workers comprise a significant portion of the working class, they have hardly been mentioned in South African labour force surveys and discussions in the past—despite the fact that more than one million people are employed as domestic workers in private households. Women dominate this sector of the labour market and this may have contributed to shunning of the domestic sector. It was with the introduction of the Sectoral Determination Seven of the Basic Conditions of Employment Act that the country began to pay more attention and in turn debate issues related to the sector. Despite domestic workers' favourable reception of the Act, they reveal a range of reactions to its clauses. This perspective reports on a study that sought to find out domestic workers' knowledge of the Act, how it has impacted on their lives and if they had begun to reap benefits from it. The focus of the perspective is limited to 28 randomly selected private households' domestic workers in the eThekwini municipality studied over a period of a year for 43 days.