The rights of platform workers in the EU’s ‘gig economy’ need to be strengthened. Negotiators from the European Parliament and the EU member states reached an agreement in Brussels on Wednesday on European rules to prevent false self-employment in driver services such as Uber or food couriers. The use of algorithms in such companies should also be more strictly and uniformly regulated across the EU, both sides said.
The directive agreed by the Council and Parliament establishes five criteria regarding bogus self-employment. If two of these conditions are met, it is legally assumed that a platform worker is permanently employed by the company and not self-employed. If the company has a different opinion, it must prove that there is no employment relationship under national law.
The five criteria are: a ceiling on the platform worker’s income, supervision of their work, including through electronic means, the company’s control over the division and allocation of tasks, the company’s control over working conditions and hours, and organizational restrictions in terms of work and appearance (clothing; pay attention). Under the planned directive, EU member states should be able to add further criteria.
Gig workers must be notified when algorithms are used for decision-making or monitoring. Companies are also prohibited from using certain data in such automated processes. This includes data about an employee’s emotional or psychological state, as well as data from personal conversations. This also includes data on actual or perceived trade union activities, biometric data and data on ethnic origin, migration status, political opinions, religion and health.
Following today’s agreement, both the EU Parliament and the Council (which brings together the 27 EU countries) must still give their final approval to the compromise text. The Member States of the Union then have two years to transpose the rules into national law. According to the European Commission, around 28 million people in the EU worked via digital platforms in 2021. The Brussels government estimates that approximately 5.5 million of them could be bogus self-employed.
Source: Krone
I’m Ben Stock, a journalist and author at Today Times Live. I specialize in economic news and have been working in the news industry for over five years. My experience spans from local journalism to international business reporting. In my career I’ve had the opportunity to interview some of the world’s leading economists and financial experts, giving me an insight into global trends that is unique among journalists.
