By Louise McMullan | 5 min
The landmark Uber judgement has caused reverberations throughout the employment law landscape and reflects the broader progress the trade union movement is making towards gaining recognition and better working conditions for all atypical workers. For Equity, organising and representing atypical workers is not new. Our members – over 40,000 actors, stage managers, dancers, directors, choreographers, models, singers and many other professionals working in theatre, live entertainment, broadcasting, the music industry and in many other fields - overwhelmingly work on short term contracts with unpredictable and irregular working patterns. The majority of our members are categorised as self-employed for taxation purposes and in recent years were also reclassified as self-employed for National Insurance purposes. Most remain workers for employment law purposes and our collective bargaining coverage remains strong in the sectors where we organise.
The complicated and changeable status of our members requires Equity to be agile, not just in our industrial strategies, but also in terms of our campaigning focus.
The Government’s intention to introduce quarterly tax reports for self-employed workers in next year’s Finance Bill (known as Making Tax Digital or MTD) will have huge negative implications for our members, with the likelihood of either increased spending on accountancy fees and administration or major difficulties in meeting reporting deadlines with consequent financial penalties. In response, we are directing our energies towards campaigning and lobbying alongside a number of other organisations for an exemption for the entertainment industry and an increase in the turnover threshold for application of the new plans from £10,000 to £83,000 in line with similar provisions for VAT registration.
We are also doing all we can to help in-work members get the best outcomes under the current package of welfare reforms. This is through developing guidance on the entertainment industry with DWP and HMRC which can then be used by decision-makers. With Universal Credit we are lobbying against the imposition of the Minimum Income Floor (MIF) under which self-employed workers viewed as ‘gainfully self-employed’ are assumed to have an income equivalent to the hourly national minimum wage x 35 coming in per week irrespective of their actual income. This will effectively remove the benefits safety net for many at times when they need it most. We brought a motion on MTD and on the wider challenges faced by atypical workers to this year’s TUC Congress. It became clear at Congress that we are not the only union actively engaged in trying to improve the working lives of precarious workers. Unions across the economy are coming up with strategies not just to tackle precarious working and to end bogus self-employment but also to bring employment rights to the gig economy and help freelance and self-employed workers to flourish in, and enjoy their jobs. In the coming years it is vital that as unions we work together and share experience of these campaigns.
At international level attention on atypical working is also intensifying. The final conference of the joint project by the International Federation of Actors, the European Federation of Journalists, EURO-MEI and the International Federation of Musicians in Brussels in September attracted the interest and the engagement of politicians from across Europe, as well as the ILO and the ETUC.
Beyond raising the profile of atypical work, important gains continue to be made industrially. For over two years Equity has been running the Professionally Made, Professionally Paid campaign. This campaign seeks to challenge poor practices and promote union contracts for use on low budget productions. Since the launch of the campaign, 168 productions have made use of the Equity Fringe Agreement, employing 800 performers and stage managers. Over 100 production companies have been involved in these shows and in total since the launch of the campaign over £1m in wages have been paid to performers and stage managers who may not have been paid before.
Winning the right for workers to be paid a wage in the entertainment industry also feeds into our campaigns for the creative industries to be more representative of society. The lack of diversity on our stages, screens, airwaves and online is one of the biggest issues our industry faces, and members from diverse backgrounds have fewer working opportunities as a result – making lack of diversity an industrial and campaigning priority for Equity. Our Play Fair campaign promotes the use of inclusive casting by employers, challenges poor practice in the casting process and raises awareness through the wider industry about its legal duties. Stronger equality and diversity clauses are also being sought through our collective negotiations with all major employers.
A greater focus on our student members also led to Equity taking part, for the first time, in the NUS/UCU national demonstration calling for free, accessible and quality further and higher education across the UK. At the same time, our Young Members’ Committee has been running mass open events around the country for Young Workers’ Month, attracting new members and activists to the union.
As we reach the end of a tumultuous year it can be difficult to reflect positively. But there are things to be hopeful about – unions are expanding into new areas, challenging new forms of exploitation and in many areas are continuing to grow.
