Self-employment

Self-employed workers have fewer employment rights than employees and no right to Statutory Sick Pay. However, many are falsely defined as self-employed and their numbers have grown. Successfully challenging that status, where it can be done, would be one way to improve their employment rights, including on sick pay, and also improve health and safety on the job.

In a case heard in 2013, construction union UCATT proved that it is possible to challenge false-self employment. A group of workers were recruited by contractor Dunne to work on the Southern General Hospital Project in Glasgow. However, it was not until several weeks into the project that they realised that their contracts had been signed with a different company called Marnoch Formwork Limited.

The contract documents contained all the provisions typically used by employers to avoid employment status. For example, the workers could refuse work, had to supply their own tools and could send a suitably qualified substitute, with the contractor’s permission. But the tribunal judge said that contract documents asserting that the men were self-employed “bore no practical relation to the reality of the relationship”.