By Dr Katie Bales, Lecturer in Law (University of Bristol Law School)
The current COVID19 crisis has shone a light on the world of work by interrupting the supply and demand necessary for global capitalism to function. In the UK context, it has drawn attention to the inadequacies of our current employment rights framework; the ways in which certain types of work is insecure and de-valued; the racialised, gendered and classed boundaries of some ‘front-line’ jobs; the vast power disparities between employers and employees; and called into question the necessity of office work, or indeed a 5 day working week.
Perhaps then this period of reflection might open up new perspectives and ideas amongst the public which could radically transform the future world of work, pushing forwards positive change which forefronts worker protection, adequate remuneration, recognition, work-life balance and interests outside of traditional ‘work’ under industrial capitalism. Below, I outline some of the areas in which these changes should take place. (more…)
Don Lane was a DPD courier, whose written contract described him as an ‘independent contractor’, aiming to ensure that he was neither an ‘employee’ nor a ‘worker’ and therefore was not entitled to the legal rights such as protection against dismissal, the national living wage, paid holidays, or even statutory sick pay. He suffered from diabetes and, having already been fined £150 for attending a hospital appointment earlier in the year, died in January 2018 after working through the Christmas season despite illness. His employers knew that he had suffered from a diabetic collapse at work but adopted a system which strongly discouraged him taking any time off for sickness: no income for sick leave and, worst of all, fines. The media has documented other examples of the abusive treatment of ‘gig’ workers in courier companies such as Hermes and Amazon.
In July 2017, ‘Good Work’, Matthew Taylor’s Review of ‘Modern Working Practices’ was published. The Report aimed to promote ‘good work’ through the adoption of 53 recommendations. In February 2018, the Government published its response, also entitled Good Work, mostly accepting the Review recommendations, but ducking their implementation by offering further ‘consultation’. Accompanying the thinly reasoned Response were four hastily drawn up consultation papers, on employment status, transparency in the labour market, agency workers and enforcement of employment rights.
While the Government says it is contemplating ‘the single largest shift in employment status since the Employment Rights Act in 1996’, its focus is on clarifying rather than extending its ambit. The reason seems to lie in its endorsement of the ‘flexibility’ of the current UK labour market, following Taylor’s lead, enabling individuals and employers ‘to make the choices that are right for them’. The notion that such choices are structurally constrained is ignored; rather the blame is laid at the door of the exceptional ‘bad’ employer. While some improvements are contemplated, they do not broaden the scope of access to statutory rights at work in a way that would have helped Don Lane or will prevent other forms of abuse. (more…)
On 29 January the House of Lords Constitution Committee delivered a withering assessment of the EU (Withdrawal) Bill, describing it as ‘fundamentally flawed from a constitutional perspective in multiple ways’. Alongside trenchant criticisms of the delegated powers in the Bill, and the effects for the devolution settlement, the Committee’s Report focuses on the definition and status of ‘retained EU law’.
The aim of this short post is to explore some of the implications of the Committee’s approach to this vexed question. If, as the Committee recommends, ‘retained EU law’ is defined narrowly, it will have the virtue of restricting the scope of the Henry VIII Henpowers in clause 7, which only apply to operational problems and deficiencies in relation to ‘retained EU law’. But a narrow definition gives rise to problems elsewhere. ‘Retained EU law’ is also the definition used for the purpose of the continuing application of existing CJEU case law and retained general principles of EU law under clause 6. Questions as to the validity, meaning and effect of pre-Brexit UK law which is not ‘retained EU law’ are therefore excluded from these interpretative provisions. In the Bill as worded, it is not clear if this difficulty is resolved by the operation of the principle of supremacy of EU law referred to in clause 5, the meaning and effect of which is very opaque. The Committee recommends that the principle of the supremacy of EU law be abandoned altogether; but if its approach were to be followed, there would be no EU principles which would apply to any law currently in the field of EU law which is not ‘retained EU law’. The implications are assessed by reference to the Equality Act 2010 (EqA). (more…)
The key words in the recent White Paper,Legislating for the United Kingdom’s Withdrawal from the European Union, are ‘certainty’ and ‘clarity’ in the interests of a ‘smooth and orderly Brexit’, repeated in the forewords and the text. To that end, the envisaged Great Repeal Bill (GRB) will initially convert the existing acquis of EU law into domestic law, including directly effective EU laws, such as Article 157 of the TFEU on equal pay. Also in order ‘to maximise certainty’ the meaning of EU-derived law will be determined ‘by reference to’ – note the vague words – the case law of the Court of Justice (ECJ) existing on the date of Brexit. This means, the White Paper happily explains in a user-friendly example in a shaded box, that workers’ rights will ‘continue to be available’ after Brexit, giving ‘certainty to service providers and users, as well as employees and employers’. In this way the GRB will apparently deliver on the Prime Minister’s promise in October last year that workers’ rights ‘will continue to be guaranteed in law’ post-Brexit.
Despite being thin on the detail of the GRB, so far all appears so good. But scratch the surface and things are not so simple underneath. (more…)
It is now pretty well-known that most of the employment rights in the UK are guaranteed by EU law—the principal exceptions are unfair dismissal and the national minimum wage —as I explained in a recent advice for the TUC. UK legislation on race discrimination, sex discrimination, equal pay and disability discrimination may have pre-dated EU Directives in these areas, but EU law led to protection against other forms of discrimination, such as detrimental treatment owing to age, sexual orientation and religion and belief. Over the years EU law has greatly supplemented or overwritten the domestic regime, almost always in favour of workers’ rights – removing limits on damages, recognising that pregnancy discrimination did not need a comparator, changing rules on the burden of proof, allowing equal pay claims for work of equal value, protecting against harassment and post-employment victimisation. I could go on.
Now extending far beyond discrimination, the EU-guaranteed rights include almost all the working time protections, including paid annual leave and limits on working hours; the protection of agency, fixed-term and part-time workers; rights on the transfers of an undertaking (extremely significant in a world dominated by out-sourcing); many rights to information and collective consultation; the most important health and safety regulations; the right to a written statement of terms of employment; protections in insolvency derived from the EU Insolvency Directive, which led to important extensions to the state guarantee of pension benefits and protection of other claims where the employer is insolvent (no doubt to be in play in relation to British Home Stores); and EU data protection law, the driving force behind the Information Commissioner’s Employment Practices Code, providing some controls over the monitoring and surveillance of workers. (more…)
The current COVID19 crisis has shone a light on the world of work by interrupting the supply and demand necessary for global capitalism to function. In the UK context, it has drawn attention to the inadequacies of our current employment rights framework; the ways in which certain types of work is insecure and de-valued; the racialised, gendered and classed boundaries of some ‘front-line’ jobs; the vast power disparities between employers and employees; and called into question the necessity of office work, or indeed a 5 day working week.
