UBER UPDATE UK
UBER LOSES APPEAL OVER DRIVER EMPLOYMENT RIGHTS
Judges have dismissed Uber’s appeal against a landmark employ- ment tribunal ruling that its drivers should be classed as workers with access to the minimum wage and paid holidays. Master of the rolls, Sir Terence Etherton, along with Lord Justice Bean, backed an October 2016 employment tribunal ruling that could affect tens of thousands of workers in the gig economy. A third judge, Lord Justice Underhill, dissented, leading to a 2-1 major- ity decision. The Guardian reports that judges found there was a “high degree of fiction” in the wording of the standard agreement between Uber and its drivers, which it argues are self-employed independent con- tractors with few employment rights. The judgment handed down on Wednesday 19 December said: “For [Uber] to be stating to its statutory regulator that it is operating a private hire vehicle service in London and is a fit and proper person to do so, while at the same time arguing in this litigation that it is merely an affiliate of a Dutch-registered company which licenses tens of thousands of proprietors of small businesses to use its soft- ware, contributes to the air of contrivance and artificiality which pervade’s Uber’s case.” Uber said it would challenge the latest ruling at the Supreme Court after being given leave to do so. The company previously appealed to the employment appeal tribunal before heading to the Court of Appeal. An Uber spokesperson said: “This decision was not unanimous and does not reflect the reasons why the vast majority of drivers choose to use the Uber app. We have been granted permission to appeal to the supreme court and will do so. “Almost all taxi and private hire drivers have been self-employed for decades, long before our app existed … If drivers were classified as workers they would inevitably lose some of the freedom and flexi- bility that comes with being their own boss.” The case began when two Uber drivers, James Farrar and Yaseen Aslam, took Uber to court on behalf of a group 19 others who argued that they were employed by the San Francisco-based com- pany, rather than working for themselves. It is one of a string of cases that have challenged the self-employed status of gig-economy workers, including action against the mini- cab firm Addison Lee and the delivery groups CitySprint, Excel and eCourier. Farrar said: “We’re really delighted and relieved but also dismayed that drivers have no remedy while Uber exhausts another appeal. It is just a cynical ploy to delay the inevitable while they pursue a [stock market flotation] next year. “It shouldn’t be us doing this. It is the government’s job to enforce the law and the mayor of London should and could do more to pro- tect drivers.” Aslam said: “We have got a union backing us and the ability to bring this case but this is not an ideal scenario for a precarious worker.” Although the ruling will not apply to employees outside the UK, the case will be closely watched by lawyers in in the many jurisdictions across the world where Uber has succeeded in disrupting licensed taxi operations. The case, led by the law firms Bates Wells Braithwaite and Leigh Day, was initially backed by the GMB union and the two lead claimants are also supported by the gig-economy union the Inde- pendent Workers Union of Great Britain (IWGB). Tim Roache, the GMB general secretary, said: “We’re now at a hat- trick of judgments against Uber; they keep appealing and keep losing. Uber should just accept the verdict and stop trying to find loopholes that deprive people of their hard-won rights and hard- earned pay.”
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15 MONTHS JAIL FOR DRIVER WHO RAN OVER TOURISTS
An Uber driver who sparked a major terror alert when he ploughed into a crowd of tourists had been driving around London uninsured and with- out a licence for two years. Tanzanian Juma Omar, 48, floored the throttle of his Toyota Prius outside the Natural History Museum and careered over the pavement, send- ing pedestrians flying into the air as others ran screaming from his path. He claimed the brakes had failed, but he was convicted of dangerous driving by a jury at the Old Bailey. According to the Daily Mail online, the court heard Omar came to Britain as an asylum seeker in 1995, but was told to get out the country in 1998. He met his wife shortly afterwards and they had four children together. Omar applied for a replacement passport in another man’s name and used that identity to pass his driving test. He got a job with Uber using the fake documents and did not have insurance when he hit the pedestrians in on Octo- ber 7 last year. Up to 11 people suffered non-life threatening injuries and Omar was wrestled to the floor and detained by members of the public. Dozens of armed police arrived fearing another terror attack was in progress in the aftermath of the London Bridge and Westminster attacks earlier that year. Omar admitted having a passport in a false name after his applica- tion for asylum was rejected. He also admitted having a false private hire licence as well as having no insurance and no driving licence. Jailing him for 15 months the judge, Mr Recorder Oliver Sells, QC, said the driving was “appallingly dangerous.” “The public is entitled to assume that the driver of an Uber car is who he says he is and they have proper qualifications - licence, insurance and the necessary paperwork “ the judge said. “You flout- ed those important safeguards so the public was at risk whenever you were driving.”
Juma Oma
THURROCK COUNCIL REQUESTS CHANGE TO UBER’S GREATER LONDON ‘GEOFENCE’
Thurrock Council has heard that the Uber app tells drivers the Essex borough is part of Greater London, where they are licensed to oper- ate. Councillors have therefore agreed to call on Uber to change its “geofence”, the virtual boundary used by the app. BBC News reports that John Kent, leader of Thurrock’s opposition Labour group, told a full council meeting: “A driver licensed by Thur- rock Council can’t simply get in their cab one morning and go and rank up in Upminster [in the London Borough of Havering]. The issue is that the Uber Greater London geofence includes Thurrock. That allows their vehicles and drivers, who are not licensed by Thurrock, to in effect operate from here as though they were in Greater Lon- don. This is wrong and we need to take steps to encourage Uber to redraw their geofence to create a level playing field in Thurrock.” A representative of the Thurrock Taxi Drivers’ Association told the meeting that Uber’s operation in Thurrock was “unlawful”. In response, Uber confirmed that its Greater London region included Thurrock, as well as Luton and Gatwick airports and some towns and cities to the west of London. In a statement, it said while its drivers were “free to choose where they want to drive”, they would still need to be licensed by an authority within the region where they wanted to drive.
JANUARY 2019
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