Political agreement reached on working conditions for platform workers

The Council and the European Parliament have reached an interim decision regarding the Directive on improving working conditions in platform work. The proposed Directive would establish requirements for classifying employment status and introduce the EU’s first-ever rules on algorithmic management and the use of artificial intelligence in the workplace. Both EU institutions must formally adopt the proposed Directive and (if adopted) Member States would be required to transpose it into national legislation within 2 years.

Platform work, defined as any work organised through a digital labour platform and performed in the Union by an individual under a contractual relationship with the digital labour platform, regardless of whether a contractual relationship exists between the individual and the recipient of the service, is currently not regulated under EU law.

According to the European Sustainability Reporting Standards (ESRS) S1 Own workforce and S2 Workers in the value chain, companies required to disclose sustainability information must also reveal specific details about their workforce. This includes, for example, the type of employment and process for engaging with the workforce and their representatives about impacts as well as the rights to privacy and data protection.

Employment status
The proposed Directive would introduce the presumption of an employment relationship (as opposed to self-employment), triggered by evidence of control and direction according to national law, collective agreements as well as taking into account the case law of the European Court of Justice. Member states would be required to establish a legal presumption of employment and the burden of proof would rest with the platform. Furthermore, platforms would be required to transmit certain information about the persons they employ to competent national authorities and trade union.

Algorithmic management and data protection
Individuals performing platform work would gain extended protection against dismissal. Platforms would be required to ensure that these workers would not be dismissed or fired based on a decision taken by an algorithm or an automated decision-making system. Furthermore, platforms would have to ensure that certain personal data, such as personal beliefs and private exchanges with colleagues, are not processed, encompassing, for instance, the collection and storage of such data).