Theme: Good psychosocial working environments: A pathway to thriving workers and strong organisations. Programme Director, Leadership of the Department of Employment and Labour, Fellow representatives of organised labour, business, and all delegates, Thank you for the invitation.
We meet here today under a theme that speaks of “thriving workers and strong
organisations.” But we must begin with honesty: for the majority of workers in South Africa. today, survival not thriving is the daily reality.
THE REALITY OF WORKERS TODAY.
We cannot speak about psychosocial wellbeing in abstraction from the material conditions of
workers. We are a country with over 12 million unemployed people. Among those employed, millions are trapped in precarious, low-wage, insecure work. Workers are facing a cost-of-living crisis, rising food prices, transport costs, and electricity tariffs. Many workers go to work hungry, stressed about debt, and uncertain about whether they will still have a job tomorrow. This is the context in which we must discuss “mental wellbeing.” Because there is no mental health without economic security.
PSYCHOSOCIAL RISKS ARE STRUCTURAL, NOT INDIVIDUAL.
We must reject the tendency to individualise workplace stress. Workers are not stressed because they are weak. Workers are stressed because the system is brutal.
Psychosocial risks are driven by: Job insecurity and retrenchments, excessive workloads and understaffing, surveillance and algorithmic management, long working hours and unrealistic targets, low wages and indebtedness, Toxic and authoritarian workplace cultures and when a worker fears dismissal every day, that is not a “wellness issue” t is a power imbalance issue.
THE CONTRADICTION: PROFITS RISE, WELLBEING DECLINES.
We are seeing a dangerous contradiction: Many companies are profitable, more than ever before, executive salaries are skyrocketing, yet workers face retrenchments, wage suppression, and worsening conditions, this contradiction is not accidental. It is systemic and a system that prioritises profits over people will always produce psychological harm.
THE ROLE OF THE STATE AND ENFORCEMENT FAILURE.
We must also speak frankly about enforcement; South Africa has progressive laws on paper, including the Occupational Health and Safety framework. But: Inspection capacity remains inadequate, many workplaces go years without inspection, violations are often not punished, and workers fear reporting abuses due to victimisation, without enforcement, rights become meaningless. A “proactive safety culture” cannot exist where employers face no real consequences.
THE NEW FRONTIER: MENTAL HEALTH AND THE FUTURE OF WORK.
The theme correctly identifies emerging pressures: Remote work, digital overload and economic stress
But we must add: The rise of the gig economy, labour broking and outsourcing, the fragmentation of the workforce, the erosion of collective bargaining and these are not neutral trends. They are restructuring work in ways that deepen insecurity and isolation.
WHAT MUST BE DONE, FROM WORDS TO ACTION.
If we are serious about psychosocial wellbeing, we must move beyond awareness campaigns.
We need structural interventions:
(1) Job Security: End abuse of labour broking and stop unjustified retrenchments in profitable companies.
(2) Living Wages: A wage that allows dignity is foundational to mental health.
(3) Enforcement: Massive strengthening of the labour inspectorate and Consequences for non-compliance.
(4) Worker Voice: Strengthen trade unions, protect collective bargaining and ensure workers can report abuses without fear
(5) Workload and Hours Regulation: Enforce limits on working hours and address understaffing
(6) Psychosocial Risk Recognition: Formal recognition of workplace stress, burnout, and trauma as occupational hazards
A WARNING: WE ARE SITTING ON A SOCIAL TIME BOMB
If we fail to act, the consequences are already visible: Rising workplace conflict, violence and instability in communities, mental health crises, substance abuse and social breakdown and a society that neglects workers’ wellbeing cannot be stable.
CONCLUSION: NO HEALTH WITHOUT JUSTICE.
Comrades and colleagues, we cannot build “thriving workers” on a foundation of unemployment, poverty and inequality and exploitation.
Psychosocial wellbeing is not a soft issue; it is a justice issue. Let us be clear: There can be no workplace wellbeing without dignity, there can be no dignity without decent work and there can be no decent work without confronting the economic system that produces insecurity.
Let this day not end with speeches and commitments that gather dust.
Let it mark a turning point, from compliance on paper to justice in reality.
I thank you.
Issued on behalf of SAFTU by the General Secretary, Zwelinzima Vavi.
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0661682157
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