The Labour Law Amendment Bills are the most significant rewrite of South African employment law in years, and most of the commentary so far has focused on dismissals and retrenchments. Read them from the other end of the employment relationship, though, and a different picture appears. Many of the proposals change decisions you make before anyone signs a contract.
They touch how you structure probation, how you engage flexible workers, how you approach senior appointments and what a permanent hire really costs over time. This article looks at the Labour Law Amendment Bills through a hiring lens. It is not legal advice, and because the Bills are still drafts, any detail below could change.
On 26 February 2026, the Minister of Employment and Labour published two drafts for public comment in Government Gazette 54220. The Labour Law Amendment Bill, 2025 amends the Basic Conditions of Employment Act (BCEA), the Employment Equity Act, the National Minimum Wage Act and the Unemployment Insurance Act. The Labour Relations Amendment Bill, 2025 amends the Labour Relations Act (LRA).
Together, the Labour Law Amendment Bills grew out of a review negotiated at NEDLAC between organised business, organised labour and government over more than two years.
The comment period closed in March. In July, the Department of Employment and Labour outlined the next steps: the Bills return to NEDLAC for finalisation, go to the State Law Advisers for constitutional vetting, and are then tabled in Parliament, which may hold its own public hearings. Promulgation is currently expected in 2028.
That timeline matters. Nothing in the Labour Law Amendment Bills is law yet. But the people you hire this year will still be on your payroll in 2028, so it pays to understand the direction of travel now.
The most hiring-relevant proposal in the Labour Law Amendment Bills is a new section 188(4) of the LRA. Ordinary unfair dismissal protection would not apply to a new employee during their first three months, or during a longer probation period set out in the contract, provided that period is reasonable and operationally justifiable. Protection against automatically unfair dismissals, such as discrimination, would still apply from day one.
The intention is to make employers more willing to take a chance on new entrants, particularly young people without work experience. It is not a licence to skip proper selection. A qualifying period only helps if you have defined what success looks like in the first 90 days and are tracking it.
It also raises the value of getting the hire right at the start, through structured interviews and thorough reference checks, rather than relying on probation to correct a weak appointment.
A proposed section 9B of the BCEA covers employees earning below the BCEA earnings threshold (R269,600.90 a year from 1 May 2026) who must be available for work but are not guaranteed hours. Employers would have to set out in writing the maximum hours per period, the window in which the employee must be available, and reasonable notice periods for reporting to work and for cancellations.
Cancel a shift without the required notice and you pay for the cancelled hours. The Bill also limits conflict-of-interest restrictions on these workers to cases with a genuine operational reason written into the contract.
For retail, hospitality, logistics and warehousing employers that rely on flexible rosters, the Labour Law Amendment Bills send a simple message. An informal “we’ll call you when we need you” arrangement will need to become a documented one with predictable terms.
Under the Labour Law Amendment Bills, employees earning above R1.8 million a year, adjusted annually for inflation, would generally lose reinstatement as a remedy for unfair dismissal unless the dismissal was automatically unfair. Their compensation would also be subject to a cap the Minister may prescribe.
Some boards may see this as lowering the risk of senior appointments. Executive candidates, in turn, may focus harder on contractual protections such as notice periods and termination terms, so expect those conversations to surface earlier in offer negotiations.
Under the Labour Law Amendment Bills, statutory severance on retrenchment would rise from one week to two weeks’ remuneration per completed year of service. The higher rate applies only to years of service that begin after the amendment takes effect, which means today’s hires will accrue it for most of their tenure.
Workforce planners should build this into the long-run cost of permanent headcount, especially in businesses with cyclical demand.
Newly established employers with fewer than 50 employees could be excluded from extended bargaining council terms and conditions for their first two years. Safeguards would stop existing businesses from restructuring simply to qualify, and all other labour laws would still apply.
For start-ups in sectors covered by bargaining councils, this part of the Labour Law Amendment Bills could make early hiring simpler and cheaper. The relief is time-bound, though, so plan for the post-exemption cost from the outset.
Following the Constitutional Court’s judgment in Van Wyk, the Bill replaces maternity-based leave with a shared parental leave entitlement. That means four months for one parent, or four months and ten days shared between two working parents, including adoptive and commissioning parents. Adoption leave would extend to children under six.
For hiring, this means planning leave cover across your whole workforce rather than part of it, and treating a clear parental leave policy as part of your employer value proposition.
Beyond hiring, several other proposals in the Labour Law Amendment Bills will shape the employment relationship after the hire. A new Schedule 11 to the LRA would extend organisational and collective bargaining rights to some workers outside the traditional definition of “employee”, including many platform workers.
The definition of an unfair labour practice would be narrowed significantly. Employees could refer harassment-based discrimination claims to the CCMA for arbitration. The National Minimum Wage Act would also clarify that deferred payments, such as retirement fund contributions, do not count towards minimum wage compliance.
You do not need to rewrite every contract today. A few practical steps will position you well, whatever final shape the Labour Law Amendment Bills take:
Hire Resolve’s specialist talent acquisition team works with South African employers across engineering, finance, IT, mining, manufacturing and logistics, and keeps hiring advice aligned with the regulatory landscape as it develops.
It is easy to read the Labour Law Amendment Bills as a story about ending employment. Look closer and many of the proposals point the same way: they reward employers who are clear and deliberate at the start of the relationship. Written terms for flexible workers, defined probation periods and contract-based protections for executives all favour clarity upfront over correction later.
With promulgation not expected before 2028, there is time to adjust. The employers who benefit most will be those who treat the next two years not as a waiting period, but as a chance to tighten the fundamentals of how they hire.
Hire Resolve SA: clients@hireresolve.us | +27 (0) 21-551-8638 | hireresolve.co.za
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