In a unanimous 8-0 city council vote, Seattle became the first city in the U.S.to allow the unionization of employees for companies like Uber and Lyft.
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For Gobena and hundreds of other drivers working for “transportation network companies” – the official city term for the app-based ride share services – the protections granted under the new ordinance could not have come sooner.
While Lyft seems to think Seattle’s decision is incongruent with federal law, there is actually precedent for unions of independent workers, including Guild Freelancers and the Washington Alliance of Technology Workers. Then a non-profit organization would step in to be a bargaining representative for the drivers with the city.
Companies like Uber typically classify their drivers as independent contractors. Yet this issue is being litigated fiercely, with some drivers alleging that companies like Uber and Lyft are in fact employers that exercise a high degree of control over their workers.
Uber also faces legal action in California on behalf of drivers who want to be considered full-time employees rather than contractors.
Uber and Lyft, for their part, have made clear their opposition to the ordinance, and have promised to fight it in court.
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. Examples include the process of determining a “qualifying driver” (drivers that qualify to collectively bargain) without providing a mechanism to access previously unshared driver data; and the process by which the FAS Director would have the nuanced responsibility to certify whether any bargained agreements meet goals identified in the legislation. Thus, Uber has said, there’s little justification for them to form unions.
What’s more, opponents have charged that allowing contractors to organize and bargain together amounts to a violation of federal anti-trust laws.
“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.
“We’ve heard from Seattle drivers making sub-minimum wage, and companies like Uber have turned a deaf ear to their concerns”, O’Brien said in a statement.
Councilman Mike O’Brien, who proposed the law, said he expects Uber to sue the city to stop the measure. The law also applies to all other drivers for taxi and for-hire companies who hold for-hire vehicle licenses.
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Opponents say the measure will costly and hard for Seattle to carry out.
