Today, 25th October 2022, the EMPL Committee of the European Parliament is hosting a hearing on the Uber Files, the global investigation on the secret lobbying activities and illegal practices carried out by the renowned platform with the objective of influencing policy making around the world, including in the EU. On this occasion, the ETUC has published a joint open letter, co-signed by SOLIDAR, CECOP, European Youth Forum, JOC Europe, Caritas Europa to seize this historical momentum for pushing for a Directive for improving working conditions in platform work that does not protect the economic interests of these platforms at the expense of social rights, but that is instead an effective instrument to fight bogus self-employment and improve working and living conditions of people working in the platform economy.

Among other things, the open letter urges that: 

• The criteria to which the activation of the employment relation is subjected in the proposal presented by the Commission are removed and rather applied as guiding elements for the rebuttal of the employment relation at national level. 
• It should be avoided at all costs that platforms devise private and parallel protection schemes, particularly when this is done to escape their responsibility as employers. This would, de facto, lead to the creation of a third category of workers, which the Commission itself has identified as an undesirable outcome. 

Download the joint letter from section on the right of this page.

SOLIDAR strongly believes that the directive proposed by the Commission and currently under discussion within the EP and the Council, is a crucial milestone for the regulation of the future of work as a whole. The platforminsation of the traditional labour market is ongoing, and technology develops at an unprecedented speed, threatening workers’ ownership of their data, their working conditions, as well as their collective bargaining power, if it is not regulated in a timely and comprehensive manner. For these reasons, we join forces with the ETUC and other civil society organisations to fight for a just future of work, where the economy is a tool for the wellbeing of all.  

You can read more about SOLIDAR’s position on the proposed directive in this briefing paper. 

Moreover, you can explore the intrinsic nature of unpaid labour in the platform economy in our thematic publication realised by KU Leuven and titled “Working for nothing in the Platform Economy”.  

Credits image: Yau Ming Low via Shutterstock