LORD LEGGATT: (with whom Lord Reed, Lord Hodge, Lady Arden, Lord
Sales and Lord Hamblen agree)
Introduction
1. New ways of working organised through digital platforms pose pressing questions about the employment status of the people who do the work involved. The central question on this appeal is whether an employment tribunal was entitled to find that drivers whose work is arranged through Uber’s smartphone application (“the Uber app”) work for Uber under workers’ contracts and so qualify for the national minimum wage, paid annual leave and other workers’ rights; or whether, as Uber contends, the drivers do not have these rights because they work for themselves as independent contractors, performing services under contracts made with passengers through Uber as their booking agent. If drivers work for Uber under workers’ contracts, a secondary question arises as to whether the employment tribunal was also entitled to find that the drivers who have brought the present claims were working under such contracts whenever they were logged into the Uber app within the territory in which they were licensed to operate and ready and willing to accept trips; or whether, as Uber argues, they were working only when driving passengers to their destinations.
2. For the reasons given in this judgment, I would affirm the conclusion of the Employment Appeal Tribunal and the majority of the Court of Appeal that the employment tribunal was entitled to decide both questions in the claimants’ favour.
The parties
3. The first appellant, Uber BV, is a Dutch company which owns the rights in the Uber app. The second appellant, Uber London Ltd (“Uber London”), is a UK subsidiary of Uber BV which, since May 2012, has been licensed to operate private hire vehicles in London. The third appellant, Uber Britannia Ltd, is another UK subsidiary of Uber BV which holds licences to operate such vehicles outside London. In this judgment I will use the name “Uber” to refer to the appellants collectively when it is not necessary to differentiate between them.
4. The claimants, and respondents to this appeal, are individuals who work or used to work as private hire vehicle drivers, performing driving services booked through the Uber app. For the purpose of the decision which has given rise to this appeal, the employment tribunal limited its consideration to two test claimants, Mr Yaseen Aslam and Mr…

Grounds of appeal

[14] The appellant contends that the primary judge erred in finding that the respondent had discharged the onus of establishing the matters required under the relevant provision.

[15] It was submitted that his Honour failed to give adequate weight to the evidence of the second witness, and that the findings of fact were not reasonably open on the material before the Court.

[16] The respondent, for its part, submits that no error is disclosed, and that the conclusions reached were well within the range of outcomes available to the primary judge.

Consideration

[17] It is convenient to deal first with the question of construction, as the resolution of that issue informs the remaining grounds advanced by the appellant.

[18] For the reasons that follow, we are of the view that the appeal should be allowed in part and the matter remitted for further determination.

Continue reading Uber BV v Aslam

Details

AGLC: Uber BV v Aslam [2021] UKSC 5
Case: [2021] UKSC 5
Decision Date

CaseChat Overview and Summary

The appellants, Uber BV and its UK subsidiaries, appeal against a decision of the Employment Appeal Tribunal that drivers who work through the Uber app are "workers" within the meaning of UK employment law and so entitled to the statutory rights that this status confers. The respondents, individual drivers, cross-appeal against a decision that they were not working within the meaning of the Working Time Regulations 1998 when logged into the Uber app but not at that time ready and willing to accept a trip. The central question on the appeal is whether the drivers work for Uber under workers' contracts or whether they work for themselves as independent contractors. If the drivers work for Uber under workers' contracts, a secondary question is whether the employment tribunal was also entitled to find that the drivers who have brought the present claims were working under such contracts whenever they were logged into the Uber app within the territory in which they were licensed to operate and ready and willing to accept trips; or whether, as Uber argues, they were working only when driving passengers to their destinations. The Supreme Court dismissed the appeal and allowed the cross-appeal. The drivers' contracts with Uber BV did not support Uber's contention that the drivers were not working under contracts with Uber. The contractual documents could not be treated as the starting point in determining whether the drivers were entitled to statutory protection as workers. The task was to determine whether the drivers fell within the statutory definition of a "worker" so as to qualify for these rights. The statutory definition includes individuals who, although not employed under contracts of employment, work under "any other contract... whereby the individual undertakes to do or perform personally any work or services for another party whose status is not by virtue of the contract that of a client or customer of any profession or business undertaking carried on by the individual". The drivers performed driving services for passengers through the Uber app, but they did not do so as independent contractors. They did so under contracts with Uber. The employment tribunal was entitled to find that a driver logged onto the Uber app in London, and within the territory in which he was licensed to operate, came within the definition of a "worker" by entering into a contract with Uber whereby he undertook to perform driving services for Uber. There was no basis for interfering with the tribunal's conclusion that periods during which the drivers were logged onto the Uber app in London, within the territory in which they were licensed to operate and ready and willing to accept trips, counted as "working time" for the purposes of the Working Time Regulations 1998.

Orders