On the go: A rise in “bogus self-employment” means many individuals are missing out on employment benefits such as a pension, according to Jack Jones, policy and campaigns support officer at the Trades Union Congress.
Speaking on June 15 at a Work and Pensions Committee hearing under the third stage of its inquiry into pension freedoms, looking into savings for later life, Jones said there has been pension participation among self-employed individuals, but it is important to focus on the “bogus self-employment” — people who should be classed as workers or employees.
Giving the example of Uber, which — as a result of GMB legal action — is having to class its drivers as workers and give them a pension, Jones said there needs to be work in this area to give these individuals the chance to take part in an occupational pension.
“We need to look a bit more about where you can get recognition agreements among gig economy employers, and whether that can be used as a way to encourage those employed, maybe even where workers are still classed as self-employed, to provide pensions for them,” he said.
According to research by the TUC, around 4.4mn people are working in the gig economy. Jones said that about 50 per cent of the workforce do platform work at least once a week.
“For those that have full-time jobs, some will be supplementing their income. We found almost 23 per cent of people have done platform work at some point,” he said.
The Pensions Regulator is encouraging gig economy companies to class staff as workers, and said it is working with gig economy employers covering about 150,000 to 200,000 people who will be auto-enrolled, which Jones said is a “small proportion”.
“We do want the kind of a presumption of worker status, unless companies can prove otherwise, rather than what you’ve got at the moment where it’s based on you accepting how the company classifies their workers unless it’s challenged,” he said.
“That would be a significant step in the right direction.”
There was no mention of an employment bill in the Queen’s Speech earlier this year, which Jones said the TUC was “very disappointed” not to see.
“It’s something we’ve been calling for a long time, and obviously the government has been claiming it is in the works for quite a long time as well. We think that’s very important,” he said.
This article first appeared on FTAdviser.com
