1. “New trade union strategies for new forms of employment”
Prof. Nicola Countouris (UCL) and Prof. Valerio De Stefano (KUL)

2. Question 1
What is the main concept of working person defining the personal scope of application of your national * labour law system? Is this concept defined by statutes/codes, by judges, or both? What are the key criteria that the law and case law use in order to identify this concept, and thus in order to define the personal scope of application of your labour law system? Are the defining elements of this concept sufficiently flexible as to adequately include at least some non-SER in the ambit of Labour Law? Is it strengthened by ‘legal presumptions’ for particular forms of non-SER? Or/and by robust ‘sham’ or, favor’, or ‘fictio iuris’ doctrines? * or supranational or international if you are an expert employed by, or directly involved in, a supranational or international institution/body.

3. Question 2 & 3
Q. 2: Is your labour law system essentially premised on the binary divide? Or does it encompass one or more intermediate categories of quasi-subordinate or economically dependent workers? If so, how are these intermediate categories defined by the law and by case law? How does you labour law system define the concept of self-employed person/worker? How does it define the concept of ‘business person’ or ‘entrepreneur’ (or equivalent category of person whose economic activities are likely to be regulated predominantly or exclusively by contract or commercial law, and not by labour law: e.g. employing staff)?
Q. 3: In your labour law system what are the labour rights that: a) self-employed persons are entitled to? b) quasi-subordinate/economically dependent workers are entitled to?

4. Question 4
How do your labour law system classify the following categories of working person: a) a nominally self-employed person offering personal work or services to one main client? b) a nominally self-employed person offering personal work or services to a multitude of clients or customers? c) a nominally self-employed person offering personal work or services to one main client, while also owning some of the ‘means of production’ necessary to generate those services? (would the answer be different if it had multiple clients?) d) a self-employed person that established a relationship with other workers (not necessarily through a subordinate work contract – it could be, for instance a relationship of association) and/or coordinates the work and services they provide? Would any part of your labour law system broadly understood (e.g. individual LL, collective LL, equality law, health and safety at work law) apply to any of these working persons? Please refer us to statutory provisions or legal precedents (if any) .

5. Question 5
Can you think of a particular collective agreement covering any term or condition of employment of particular categories or groups of self-employed persons or professionals? E.g. freelance journalists, or self-employed musicians? Do any of your national professional orders still set (unilaterally or otherwise) minimum fees for professional services? If you are an expert employed by, or directly involved in, a supranational or international institution, are there any aspect of your labour standards (including freedom of association and the right to collective bargaining) that also apply to members of the liberal professions or of professional orders?

6. Question 6
Are there any obstacles (including statutory prohibitions) to self-employed persons setting their terms and conditions of employment/service (and in particular the level of remuneration) by means of collective agreements? Does the situation change if organisations also representing “employees” are involved in the process of collectively negotiating terms and conditions of service of the self-employed?

7. Question 7
Are there any reform debates currently taking place in your legal systems and involving either the concepts of worker/work or the personal scope of application of (some areas of) labour law ? Can you give us some examples ?

8. Question 8
Could you please share your views on a definition of employing entity (in effect operating as a ‘presumption of employer status’ ) that would apply to ‘whichever party in practice substantially determines the terms of engagement or employment of a worker’. Any other suggestions?

9. Would you like to engage with the questionnaire?
Please us