In an unprecedented move, the record rand price of gold has prompted gold mining company Sibanye Gold to exercise its bona fides by calling on its employees, unions and associations to return to the table, not to reopen wage negotiations, but to enter into a dialogue on an innovative social and economic compact involving job protection when margins are low and the exercise of greater wage latitude when margins recover. The South African gold mining industry as a whole tabled the same concept during last year’s wage negotiations, where it was spurned by unions who viewed it with suspicion.
