The Worst of Both Worlds: Australia's Uber Drivers Not Deemed Workers

Jack Jablonski

As long as we depend on our exploiters, we must take nothing for granted. This is the bitter lesson learned recently by Australia’s Uber drivers, who are facing the uphill battle to be recognised as, in fact, employed by Uber. The struggle for the rights workers are entitled colours a new but familiar era of class antagonism in Australia.

The honourable history of trade unionism held to the Australian proletariat’s name is one of its greatest achievements. From the colonial era through to the 1980s, militant working class organisations won decent pay, hours, awards and conditions through strike struggles. Since then conditions have ebbed, with unionism never returning to its former glory. In fact, it was under the Hawke Labor government that unions were castrated, and the corporate union born. Workers’ rights stagnated, and the struggle dampened. Although Australia has never been socialist and has always been ruled by a dictatorship of the bourgeoisie, it was more profitable (because of working class militancy) – for a measured period – to treat certain workers with a certain humanity. 

Typically, the neoliberal era changes the nature of class relations drastically. In this era, industry, like telecommunications and agriculture, is privatised, trade unions castrated, and the capitalist class carry out any violent measure to maintain profits. Certain “white-collar” professions become wealthier high-waged occupations, while the rights fought for by the other less-fortunate workers, the vast majority of Australians, begin to dissipate and class lines become more distinct. Antagonisms brew. certain industries suffer heavily. 

By some quirk of bourgeois legality, Uber-drivers have been completely deprived of the rights awarded to workers by being stripped of their worker status entirely. By considering their employees “independent contractors”, Uber relieved itself of the financial burden that comes with treating workers as humans. This is a necessity for employers looking to profit; the property and business owning classes have no time for such petty notions as “humanity”. Uber driver Asim Nawaz expressed that Uber exercises the “whole of the control” (Workplace Express, 2022) [1]. 

As Uber-drivers in the UK won their right to be seen as workers before the law, Uber-drivers in Australia sought the same small but significant victory. Nawaz appealed to the Fair Work Commission (FWC), claiming that his conditions were indeed employee-like and that he should have the rights which therefore apply. 

He noted, specifically, that although you can work “independently” and have a certain freedom to drive for whatever ride-sharing app you wish whenever you wish, by logging-in to drive for Uber (the monopoly player on the market) you are submitting yourself to a cruel and rigid contract which dominates your ability to work until you sign out. You are working for Uber. Nawaz argues that the economic situation today incentivises drivers to log-on regularly and accept as many jobs as possible. 

While logged on to the Uber system, drivers are contractually bound to work at a pre-determined rate, take controlled routes, accept all jobs (lest they face Uber’s punishment), maintain strict cleanliness standards, and answer interrogatory questions when any stops are made (Workplace Express, 2022).[4] Uber is constantly monitoring its non-workers so as to ensure maximum efficiency and profits. These are not the liberated conditions that “independent contractor” brings to mind. The bind is twofold. They suffer all the negative attributes and none of the freedoms of an “independent contractor”, and are burdened with everything that comes with traditional employment but have none of the rights therein deserved. 

With the worst of both worlds, Nawaz’s appeal went to the FWC and was promptly rejected mid-June 2022, his application dismissed. The FWC considered his application unfair (Asim Nawaz v Rasier Pacific Pty Ltd T/A Uber B.V., 2022) [2]. This afront to Uber’s devious and greedy bourgeois practice has failed, solidifying Uber’s ability’s to ruthlessly exploit its workers (calling them what they are) in clear view of the Labor government. It also solidifies a greater shift to the gig economy. This is an economic situation where the labour market is so competitive and work is so unstable, that it can only be guaranteed in the very short-term. Circumspect contracts define precarious labour. They weaken proletarian bargaining power, while rapidly increasing the rate of exploitation.

However, we must realise that precarious and unstable employment, littered with unfair one-sided contracts, is nothing new. Since Australia’s colonial settlement, the working class have struggled to meet their basic needs. For most of Australia’s history, daily economic life has been rough. Although there are occasional economic upturns, like the one we are presently emerging from, they are the anomaly. The attack on workers’ rights felt so nakedly by Uber drivers, coupled with a cost of living crisis, is to be expected under capitalism. 

We are facing new beasts, but they are born in the same lair and the same working-class militancy must be wielded against them. They have evolved, grown larger, and become more experienced. But – in all of these ways – we have also developed. The fierceness of capital can only grow as the working class does, and as the inevitable revolution approaches, the capitalists must tangle themselves in a web of contradictions of all sorts. Here we see the rich Uber profiteers bury themselves in legal loopholes. Such methods of defence are hypocritical; how can a company at once exercise total power and be absolved of any responsibility? Uber are performing a wholly unsustainable act. 

We have seen already, in a country where capitalism is older, and where contradictions are therefore stronger and class antagonisms necessarily sharper, a victory made by Uber drivers. The UK’s Supreme Court ruled that Uber drivers are workers, entitling them to a minimum wage, holiday pay and pension plans, in response to thousands of workers taking legal action, protesting, and striking (Barratt, et al., 2021) [3]. We must support Australia’s Uber-drivers as their struggle matures into this stage. As gas prices double, cost of food rapidly increases, and rents skyrocket, Uber-drivers, alongside all workers, will face conditions that warrant immediate and serious action on a mass scale. Nawaz’s appeal is one step of many to come. 

“How can a company at once exercise total power and be absolved of any responsibility?”

A return to a highly exploitative gig economy amidst massive inflation, not to mention ecological breakdown, comes as capitalism in Australia develops heightened contradictions. The gross sharpening of class antagonism leaves all exploited people with little choice but to organise. The most revolutionary action has a noticed tendency to emerge at the weakest links in the chain of capitalism (Stalin, 1924, pp. 24 ) [4]. The gig economy in Australia represents such a link. Having already suffered a marked defeat in the UK, Uber’s Australian-counterpart is trembling, terrified to give up any ground. And, of course, Karl Marx would have said, let them tremble.  

Sources

[1] Workplace Express, 2022. Workplace Express. [Online]
Available at: https://www.workplaceexpress.com.au/nl06_news_print.php?selkey=61263
[Accessed 18 July 2022].

[2] Asim Nawaz v Rasier Pacific Pty Ltd T/A Uber B.V. (2022) Fair Work Commission. 

[3] Barratt, T., Veen, A. & Goods, C., 2021. A new deal for Uber drivers in UK, but Australia’s ‘gig workers’ must wait. [Online]
Available at: https://theconversation.com/a-new-deal-for-uber-drivers-in-uk-but-australias-gig-workers-must-wait-157597
[Accessed 18 July 2022].

[4] Stalin, J., 1924. Foundations of Leninism. 1st ed. Moscow: Pravda.