Lie detector (polygraph) tests in South Africa, 2020

There are a few things that we hate more than labour broking.

One of these things is lie detector or 'polygraph' tests in factories and warehouses in South Africa.

These are used regularly in factories and warehouses to monitor workplace honesty, mostly to prevent pilfering and similar forms of dishonesty. Workers' contracts often require them to submit to polygraph tests as often as once a month.

For years, workers' lawyers have had to deal with these tests and workers being dismissed as a result of these tests through expert testimony. For example, mugs would go missing at work, and to determine who had stolen the mugs, workers would get asked during a polygraph test if they had stolen the mugs. If they answered 'No, I have not stolen your ugly coffee-stained mugs', but the polygraph machine indicated that this was a lie, this could be used against the worker.

Over and over again, experts have had to explain that these tests are unscientific and have 50% success rate. A 50% success rate is the rate of chance. This means that to find out if a worker is telling the truth about something, you can either strap them to a polygraph machine, or you can toss a coin, the effectiveness of your method is the same.

The difficulty is that this expert evidence on reliability did not forbid the test being administered in the first place. It has merely meant that a test result that finds that a worker is lying cannot be used to dismiss them.

Is that enough? Employers think so. We don't. There is something about a white line manager strapping a black worker up to a chair and trying to read their mind while interrogating them that gets our goat.

We are exploring ways to stop this demeaning and archaic practice, and will be in the Labour Court arguing that polygraph tests are a form of psychological testing, which means that they are prohibited under section 8 of the Employment Equity Act. To see our full arguments, check out our newest page.

And finally, following a request from one of our readers for 'more Fleetwood Mac'...