Frank Field calls for action against "widespread injustice" in the entertainment economy | Business

According to a report from Independent MP Frank Field, the government should take action to end the "rampant injustice" that some show economy workers are facing.

Field, who chairs the select committee on work and pensions, calls for an accelerated system for labor courts involving worker status cases, as well as the establishment of a single labor market regulator.

The report says that there is evidence that some companies continue to exploit workers that they have wrongly clbadified as independent contractors.

"The unions are involved in trials that have lasted for seven years. The idea that the law works is ridiculous, "Field said.

His report comes after Gary Smith, a Kent heating engineer, lost last week his bid to claim £ 74,000 of vacation pay, while he had spent years establishing that he was a "worker" entitled to such benefits in a case against Pimlico Plumbers that ended in the Supreme Court.

Field said that labor courts should be empowered to speed up worker status procedures and recommend that their findings be applied at the enterprise level. In a series of recent cases, companies have avoided widespread reform, claiming that the court's findings only concern the individuals involved.

"The laws governing work in the entertainment economy are inadequate," the report says.

"There is virtually no proactive enforcement mechanism to prevent workers from being misclbadified as" independent contractors "and subjected to false forms of self-employment. It is currently the responsibility of every worker to enforce the law.

"We want to build a unit that is a" friend of the people "to which they can go and they know that they will not be transferred to a place that does not have the necessary resources," Field added. "The regulator should be able to keep its fines for self-financing."

The government has presented labor market reform plans, including giving workers a list of their immediate rights, including paid leave and sick leave. The bill is being pbaded by parliament and is expected to be introduced next year.

The government should soon publish proposals for a single labor market enforcement agency, which would bring together the work currently being done by the HMRC, the gang masters and the authority responsible for abuses of the labor market. work, among others.

But MPs and labor rights groups are frustrated by the pace of action.

In 2017, the Special Committee on Work and Pensions and the Committee on Business Strategy, Energy and Industry drafted a bill to eliminate loopholes allowing irresponsible enterprises to underpay workers. "