Speaking to a Work and Pensions Committee hearing, Trade Union Congress (TUC) Policy & Campaigns Support Officer Jack Jones has said that “bogus self-employment” is leading to many gig economy workers missing out on employment benefits, including pensions.
While noting pensions participation among the UK’s self-employed workforce, Jones insisted that there are many classed as self-employed who should instead be classified as employees or workers and said work is required to enable these individuals to enrol in an occupational pension scheme.
Recently, the Pensions Regulator said that it was working alongside gig economy employers with the aim of getting between 150,000 and 200,000 workers auto-enrolled in pension schemes. However, Jones said that this represents a “small proportion” of gig economy contractors who should be classed as workers.
TUC research has indicated that approximately 4.4 million people work in the UK’s gig economy, with Jones saying that around 50 per cent of those individuals do gig economy work at least once per week. Jones added: “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.”
Last week, Pensions Regulator CEO Charles Counsell suggested that the definition of a “worker” could be changed in order to push more gig economy firms to enrol contractors they engage in pension schemes. Regarding worker status, Jack Jones said: “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. That would be a significant step in the right direction.”
Jones also spoke of the TUC’s disappointment at the omission of an employment bill from this year’s Queen’s Speech, saying: “It’s something we’ve been calling for 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.”
