"Gig-gling at last: EU adopts gig work directive", 24 April 2024

The directive is the bloc’s first attempt at regulating the growing gig work economy and seeks to ensure that workers benefit from the contractual status that best fits their relationship with digital platforms like Uber, Bolt or Deliveroo.

The file also creates new rules on algorithmic management in the workplace. It enshrines a complete prohibition on the processing of certain sets of data and ensures that significant algorithmic decisions – on dismissal, allocation of work, and remuneration – are overseen by a human being...

The Council must still formally adopt the text – a procedural step which should cause no significant delays. Member states have two years to integrate and implement the directive into their national legal systems...

Wednesday’s adoption marks the end of a long cycle of intense negotiations, often loaded with concerns that the file might not even see the light of day by the end of this legislature.

Disagreements were particularly fierce over the creation of a new tool called legal presumption of employment, which looked to harmonise reclassification processes through which self-employed platform workers could become full-time employees with accompanying welfare rights.