DOMESTIC APPLIANCES ASSOCIATION OF SA
Associations in Johannesburg

Government had appointed a Director-General of War Supplies and a Controller of Industrial Manpower. The new structure moved away from regionalism and opened the way for majority representation on the council for registered employer associations. The urgent demands of war brought massive expansion and technological development in the metal and engineering industry. Faced with a cut-off in the overseas supply of production equipment and finished articles, South African industry rose to the challenge with remarkable ingenuity and resourcefulness. Peace brought not a feared recession but an explosive increase in South Africa’s metal and engineering industry. For the first time domestic appliances and radios were made in South Africa. Output, measured in quantities, increased significantly. The fundamental difference was that black trade unions could not take part in centralised collective bargaining or make use of the industrial council system. The Industrial Conciliation Act became the core of South Africa’s labour relations. A year later South Africa withdrew from the Commonwealth and became a republic. But these events also demonstrated two things: the country still had considerable financial resources to invest in new productive capacity, and its people were extraordinarily resilient and innovative as they sought to survive the increasing isolation. Fundamental to Fortress SA was government’s support of local industry. State departments gave preference across the board to local manufacturers. High level investigations took place to find ways of replacing imports with local products. The long-term import replacement and infrastructural development strategies implemented at the time still benefit South Africa today. The associations were charged with negotiating wages and employment conditions with the trade unions. Industrial progress brought new demands on the federation and, as a result, divisions were set up to deal with labour, economics, education and training, and administration. With the formation of the National Industrial Council for the industry, control of apprenticeship training became a national function under the National Apprenticeship Board. Trade union and employer representation on the board was bolstered by members with special expertise. Furthermore, the Act inhibited the progress of black workers into more skilled job categories in an industry which had long been inhibited by a shortage of skilled white workers. In 1972 an agreement was reached with the industry’s trade unions to allow black workers to advance into higher skilled (previously white) operative jobs. At the same time it sought to bolster the economy by funding ambitious infrastructure development and import replacement projects and through high tariffs and generous export incentives. In the early Eighties the production of the industry was more than R10 billion, or about a third of the country’s manufacturing output. On the industrial relations front in 1980, two registered black trade unions became fully-fledged members of the industrial council.