PETER BRUCE: How insourcing tells our unyielding story
Outsourcing is the only way of putting flesh on the bones of the small business evolution but it must be done correctly
The joy (and probably relief) on their faces was unmistakable. And who could begrudge poor men that? But I found the fuss made by the City of Johannesburg and the mayor, Herman Mashaba, about the insourcing last week of 1,600 security guards deeply depressing. As I say, I’m happy for the men, but as a former leader of the Free Market Foundation even the mayor would have appreciated the fact that it was, for our economy, a moment of failure, not success. Insourcing is the increasingly inevitable result of outsourcing. And, if you think about it, outsourcing is the only way of putting flesh on the bones of the small business evolution so many people not so long ago put their faith in as a way to empower new, and small, black-owned businesses. How else were new black companies going to get into IT, transport, cleaning and, yes, security if nasty Big Business kept them out of the economy by hogging all those tasks for themselves? Bidvest, the giant services company formerly run by Brian...
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