The Department of Labour (DoL) will on Tuesday begin an investigation into the building sector with a view to establishing a sectoral determination (SD), which prescribes minimum wages and conditions of employment for specific industries.

SDs dealt with the protection of workers in vulnerable sectors and areas of work, setting minimum working hours, minimum wages, allowed leave days and termination rules.

The building sector currently had no SD but was instead covered by labour bargaining councils in the various provinces.

The DoL said in a statement on Monday that it would host a series of national public hearings aimed at obtaining inputs from employers and employees in the building sector regarding the feasibility of establishing a SD for the building sector, as well as the categories of employees to be covered by the regulations.

These consultations would further determine the mechanism to be used for setting minimum wages and yearly increases, determine the factors to be taken into consideration when setting minimum wages and establish at which level minimum wages should be set.

The initial public hearing and two site visits of building sector undertakings were due to start in Pretoria on Tuesday, allowing stakeholders in the sector to submit their inputs.

The hearings would end on August 29 in George, Newcastle and Polokwane respectively.

South Africa currently has SDs for artistic and cultural activities, as well as the children in the performance of advertising; civil contract cleaning; civil engineering; domestic worker; farm worker; forestry; hospitality; learnerships; private security; taxi; and the wholesale and retail sectors.