Seattle the first city to let Uber drivers unionize

David Rohrsheim, Australia and New Zealand general manager for Uber, has constantly reaffirmed that Uber’s driver partners are “certainly not employees” as they are independent operators who are free to come and go if they do not wish to drive at a certain time.

The vote is a victory for the App-Based Drivers Association, or ABDA, of Seattle, an organisation of on-demand contract workers that lobbied with the local Teamsters union for the legislation. Under the City Charter, the ordinance will become law without my signature.

“We have urged the full Council and the Mayor to reject the bill”. Lyft isn’t pleased with the ruling; Uber hasn’t yet commented. “I believe there should be some solutions”.

Reaction has been mixed after the Seattle City Council voted to give drivers for ride-hailing companies, taxis and for-hire transportation companies the right to unionize over pay and working conditions.

Last week, the judge in the federal case found that some parts of Uber’s arbitration agreements with its drivers to be unenforceable, Reuters reported.

But both companies have said that requiring fingerprint checks, because of the cost and inconvenience of getting fingerprints taken, would discourage people from applying to be drivers and undercut their business model of having ample drivers on the road most of the time.

Seattle is no stranger to pioneering workers’ rights legislation, the AP noted. The New York Times observes that if the right were conferred upon contractors working for the likes of Lyft and Uber, it would be a national first. It would give independent drivers the same rights employees have under the National Labor Relations Act, such as the ability to organize and bargain collectively.

“Unfortunately, the ordinance passed today threatens the privacy of drivers, imposes substantial costs on passengers and the City, and conflicts with longstanding federal law”, the statement said. The plaintiffs named in the suit say they are Uber employees, not independent contractors, and have been shortchanged on expenses and tips.Uber has about 400,000 drivers nationwide with about 10,000 in Seattle.

Uber and Lyft say drivers have flexibility in deciding when they work and how many hours, and many chose to drive to supplement their income. “I believe the council, given that we’ve studied this issue and are now united moving forward, will work with the mayor and various departments to make sure this can be accomplished”.

There are other unionization efforts afoot in California.

“I think one really great thing about the proposed Seattle ordinance is it takes away some of the incentive to misclassify drivers [as independent]”, Garden said.

As cities around the world continue to debate ride-sharing apps like Lyft and Uber, Seattle is debating something a little different. Earlier this year, the 2016 Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton said that while the on-demand, gig economy is creating innovations, it is also “raising hard questions about workplace protections and what a good job will look like in the future”.