Uber drivers should be treated as employees and not contractors, as per a ruling by New Zealand’s Supreme Court.
In October 2022, Julian Ang, Mea’ole Keil, Nureddin Abdurahman and Praful ‘Bill’’ Rama, the four drivers of Uber had won their case against Uber seeking to be treated as employees, and hence, be protected by the employment laws of New Zealand. At the time, the Court had ruled that these drivers were certainly not operating businesses of their own, but only serving as drivers for Uber; that it was Uber that was running its own business, handling everything from marketing its services, setting prices and defining the nature of service provided, and so on.
The rideshare company had appealed in 2022 against this ruling by the Employment Court that said the drivers were to be seen as employees instead of independent contractors. However, the Supreme Court ruled in favour of the four drivers.
This is a welcome win for the two unions that had filed the case on behalf of the drivers. Uber sought to consider the drivers as independent contractors that merely used its platform, and not employees.
Many other countries, such as the UK have given ‘employee’ status to Uber drivers, giving them rights for collective bargaining. Uber drivers in New Zealand may now be able to seek the same rights following the recent ruling. In addition to full employment rights, they could now demand compensation for being underpaid and deprived of entitlements.
The status of ‘employee’ will open doors to various benefits, such as entitlement to minimum wages, minimum working hours, rest periods, breaks, holidays, parental leave, sick leave, right to question unfair termination, and so on.
Uber is reportedly unhappy with the ruling.
