Thank you very must for the question, hon member. I think what I would emphasise in response to the question is that there are two types of contravention that we are seeing in the market. The first kind of contraventions is where companies were unfamiliar with the codes and don't comply with the letter of the law, but there is no intention to mislead. The other example is where a company seeks ruthlessly to exploit the law by misrepresenting what it is seeking to do and by undermining the objectives of the law.
Those are two different categories. The first category requires better education; more clarity by the policy makers - that is government; and vigilance about practices. The second kind of problem requires the book to be thrown, so to speak, at the guilty parties. In other words: Full investigation; prosecution for breach of the law; and for the penalties that the law sets out to be invoked.
Where there are examples of people actively seeking to subvert the law, imprisonment is an option that the courts have. I suspect that as the practice has settled, the courts will increasingly say companies ought to know by now what the acceptable practices are.
I will look also in future, hon member, whether there is some simplification that is needed, so that there is no misunderstanding in the market about what is required. This, we are talking of course of the BEE legislation.
However, let me use an analogy: In the Competition Law, for a number of years, we had what was called a yellow card. A yellow card was where a company was found guilty of abusive dominance - certain kinds of abusive dominance. Then, it would get a warning and thereafter it would be fined heavily if it did the same thing a second time. We have now recently removed the yellow card.
So, now if you are found guilty, the penalty kicks in immediately. We have done so because we believe there is much greater knowledge in the market. Companies now know what an acceptable behaviour is. We have a rich jurisprudence.
In other words, the courts have found what kind of behaviour is acceptable and what is not acceptable. With the greater policy clarity and a greater clarity that the courts have given, they have codified the behaviour that is not acceptable and behaviour that is acceptable, we can be tougher with companies. I think we are going to enter a similar approach with the BEE legislation to what we had with the competition legislation. Thank you.
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