What’s happening with the Protection of Personal Information legislation?
Labour Bulletin | 8 July, 2010 | Hot Topics:
Dear Reader
What’s happening with the Protection of Personal Information legislation?
New legislation has been in the pipeline for some time now in the area of privacy and data protection. When it comes into operation it will have a great impact on many aspects of your human resources function.
You must be aware of what employee information you get and retain and what your obligations are disseminating this information.
Here’s a quick update on the progress of the Bill
The Ad Hoc Committee on Protection of Information Legislation (National Assembly) recently invited interested individuals and organisations to make written submissions on the Protection of Information Bill. The closing date for these submissions was 25 June 2010. Public hearings for selected oral presentations are scheduled for Wednesday, 21 and Thursday, 22 July 2010. It plans to hold further deliberations on 27 July 2010, 30 July 2010, 10 August 2010 and 17 August 2010. The Committee has to submit its final report by no later than 30 September 2010.
It’s still the President’s decision
If the Bill’s contents don’t need to be reconsidered and the final report is submitted within the time frames, the Bill will be referred to the National Council of Provinces for consideration and comment. The NCOP will then send it back to National Assembly once it’s rejected or approved it. The NA isn’t, strictly speaking, bound to agree with the NCOP's stance on the Bill and can approve it after they have received it back from the NCOP even if it was rejected. Finally, the President must agree to the Bill before it becomes law.
Don’t worry about being left in the dark...we’ll keep you up to date
It’s likely that the presentations and deliberations will raise a few areas of concern which the Committee will consider. The Committee will then need to start the above process all over again. It’s impossible to put an exact date on when the Bill will become law, but you should be aware of what it means to you and what you must do to prepare! We’ll keep you posted on any further developments.
Until next month...
Susan Stelzner
Editor-in-chief: Labour Law for Managers Loose Leaf Service
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Editors note
Michelle Govender
Labour Bulletin Editor
The Labour Bulletin team speaks to subscribers every week on landmark labour events and offer valuable and practical information from the Handbook, from questions and answers and from our experts that subscribers can use now to benefit their business.