Uber: Supreme Court Ruling

Lord Faulks Excerpts

Monday 1st March 2021 Lords Chamber

[Lord Callanan (Con)]

As I said, we are committed to considering options to improve clarity on employment status and how best to address that in a post-Covid scenario. However, it is important that we retain the flexible labour market that has served this country so well and has resulted in our unemployment rate being significantly better than that of the rest of Europe.

[Lord Faulks (Non-Afl) [V]]

My Lords, I too welcome the decision of the Supreme Court. Those who have read the judgment of Lord Justice Leggatt will realise the detail which the court went into in deciding that, whatever the lawyers had devised, the reality of the relationship meant that the Uber drivers were in fact workers. I welcome the news that there is to be legislation, but I suggest that there are some occasions where the courts will have to deal with the reality. Even the best-drafted legislation will have to set out the principles. The courts here were doing precisely what they should do—applying the principles of the Act to the reality on the ground.