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Minister tells ADCU bogus self-employment is unacceptable in new letter on private-hire driver rights
Private-hire drivers classified as workers are entitled to the National Minimum Wage and paid annual leave regardless of how a platform calculates their pay, the Minister of State for the Future of Work has told the App Drivers’ and Couriers’ Union (ADCU).
In a letter dated 1 September, Kate Dearden MP said employers must meet those obligations “regardless of the business model they use or whether pay is calculated through dynamic, algorithmic or platform-based systems”. She added that HMRC and the Fair Work Agency “will not hesitate to take action where breaches occur”.
Dearden was responding on behalf of the Secretary of State to a 22 July letter from ADCU general secretary Cristina-Georgiana Ioanitescu about private-hire working conditions and the Government’s planned employment status consultation. The minister said the department could not comment on the practices of individual companies.
“Bogus self-employment is unacceptable,” Dearden wrote. “Employers should never seek to deny people their employment rights and avoid their own legal obligations by claiming someone is self-employed when in reality they are not.”
The letter acknowledges the Supreme Court’s 2021 ruling on Uber drivers’ worker status. That judgment upheld findings that the drivers who brought the case were workers for the purposes of employment rights law.
Dearden advised drivers who believe their rights are being violated to seek legal advice and pursue the matter through established legal channels.
On account deactivation, Dearden said the department had raised concerns with Uber after they were brought to it by the Organise Network.
The Government plans to consult on employment status “in due course”, Dearden said. She described the aim as addressing weaknesses in the framework that can leave vulnerable workers, including some in the platform economy, without core protections.
ADCU General Secretary Cristina-Georgiana Ioanitescu said: "The Secretary of State has now put it in writing: bogus self-employment is unacceptable, worker rights apply whatever business model an employer uses, and HMRC and the Fair Work Agency must take action where the law is broken. That is a welcome step from this new Labour administration.
"We intend to take the Secretary of State at his word. Uber is in daily breach of the Supreme Court judgment. It continues to deny drivers worker status, minimum wage, and paid leave. We will be pursuing every legal avenue available to enforce those rights, and we now expect the government to follow through on its promises, and instruct HMRC and the Fair Work Agency to take robust action against app companies operating in open breach of the law.
"Every day that passes without enforcement is another day drivers are robbed of what the courts have already said is theirs. The government has stated its position clearly. We will be pressing them relentlessly to turn those words into action."
