Wits spending R120m on insourcing workers this year
A task team lead by Advocate Dali Mpofu was formed to assess the feasibility of insourcing last year after student protests.
JOHANNESBURG – Wits University says it’s spending about R120 million on insourcing workers at the institution this year.
A task team lead by Advocate Dali Mpofu was formed to assess the feasibility of insourcing last year after student protests.
The first group of workers were insourced at the beginning of this year.
Wits Vice-Chancellor professor Adam Habib says the university has had to cut down on cost concerning research, operational expenses and salaries in order to afford insourcing.
“People are effectively taking a net 6.5% decrease in their operational budget and we’ve approached many researchers and said to them that we’ll be looking to take some funds, where possible, from the research budget for the next two years. In years to come we’ll be more prudent in our salary increase so that we can effectively make up for R120 million.”
The university is set to be insourcing just over 1,500 workers, with 344 who have been officially employed by the university at the beginning of January.
Insourcing was first explored after activists at the university heard pleas from workers who complained about low salaries and job insecurity.
(Edited by Leeto M Khoza)
