Contents:
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It is evident that, for employers, a self-employed legal status for teleworkers has many advantages. It is far cheaper in terms of taxation and far more flexible because it allows a wide discretionary power there is no labour protection and total contractual freedom. However, it might be pointed out that in some circumstances, the cost advantage to employers would be lessened if the worker concerned has a scarce skill, which can be sold at a high price. The national reports from Belgium , France, Ireland, Luxembourg, Portugal, Spain and the UK indicate that the use by employers of "false self-employment" as a way of circumventing labour law is a problem.
This perceived propensity not exclusive to teleworking, which is a minority form of work organisation in all Member States to avoid traditional employment contracts is being addressed in some countries. In Germany, the Netherlands and the UK, the concept of subordination as a test of the existence of an employment relationship in case law is being revised in favour of concepts of "economic dependence" and "integration in the organisation".
Furthermore, some countries have defined a specific status for people who are formally or personally independent but economically dependent in their work - as in Austria "employee-like person" , the Netherlands "quasi self-employed worker" and Italy "coordinated freelance worker". This is an intermediate status between employee and self-employed worker, which is only partially protected by employment law.
However, in many cases it is not easy to apply this new legal status to the telework situation. In Italy, several bills which would regulate telework have been under discussion for some time, covering both employees and "coordinated" freelance workers.
The most important of these is the "New Jobs Statute", which seeks to give a general definition of the rights of atypical workers that would include teleworkers. In Greece, a recent law defines telework as an "atypical form of employment. The use of the homeworking category for teleworkers is also problematic. In the countries in which this category exists, its regulation is insufficient. In most countries, the regulations are obsolete, having been designed essentially to provide legal support for workers linked to craft workshops. Thus, they do not provide adequate protection for teleworkers because: Furthermore, the legal status of homework is not the same in all countries.
In some countries homeworkers have employee status Spain , while in others they may have employee or self-employed status Germany , and in yet others homeworking is a de facto rather than a legal category UK.
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When the teleworking contract is defined as an employment relationship, the issues centre on the regulation of employment conditions. A salaried teleworker enjoying full rights cannot always exercise them due to the special characteristics of working outside the traditional workplace eg at home, on the road or in a client company and using telecommunications. Such gaps in regulation arise in area as diverse as:. The need may arise for a revision of existing regulations, so that employees who do not carry out their work physically within the company can exercise their rights as employees.
Some countries have undertaken initiatives in this direction:. In many countries, telework is not regulated at all by collective bargaining. In these countries, telework as such is not dealt with in collective agreements at any level, though in some countries - especially the Netherlands - the unions have tried to incorporate this topic in the bargaining agenda.
In some companies, a succession of individual agreements between companies and workers has led to a certain degree of regulation, sometimes even with the involvement of works council-type bodies, but teleworking is not strictly speaking regulated through collective bargaining. Spain can also be included in this group, although in this country bargaining is starting to develop: In other countries there has been some development of collective bargaining on telework at company level, although in general this is a relatively new phenomenon.
Austria and Norway can also be included in this group, although with some reservations. In Norway, collective bargaining on teleworking seems to be less developed. In Austria, besides some company agreements, there is a sectoral agreement in the mineral oil industry that regulates teleworking, but it has met with strong resistance among employers and no further sectoral agreements are foreseen in the near future. Finally, in a small number of countries collective bargaining on telework seems to be more developed and "articulated", combining company agreements with an emergent development of sectoral agreements.
In Sweden, sectoral agreements include a joint recommendation in tarde, commerce and services, establishing guidelines for lower-level agreements. In Italy, company agreements began to deal with the topic of telework in , and since sectoral agreements have been signed which regulate this question in retail and telecommunications. Finally, in Denmark teleworking has received special attention since , with the signing of sector agreements that deal with this topic in the state public sector, the regional and municipal public sector and the banking sector.
In industry, retail and services, protocols on telework have been added to collective agreements, and committees are currently discussing the subject.
Denmark is also the country in which collective bargaining on telework is most articulated. Sectoral agreements differentiate between aspects dealt with in the sectoral agreement itself, in company agreements and in individual agreements between employer and worker. These three levels are "subsequent", so there must be a sectoral agreement and a company agreement before an individual agreement can be entered into. There are no general data on the extent to which teleworkers across the EU are covered by collective bargaining. The table below provides examples of collective agreements on teleworking from the countries covered by this study.
There is no information available on trade union membership among teleworkers. It might be assumed that unionisation is often relatively high among teleworkers covered by collective bargaining on the issue, because they are employees of large companies with open-ended contracts, in some cases participating in experimental telework programmes supervised by trade unions.
Unionisation is probably far lower among employees with individual teleworking agreements or self-employed workers.
There are no known specific associations of teleworkers with a collective bargaining role though see below. Within unions, there is a certain amount of debate on the impact of teleworking on trade unionism. The dispersion and isolation of the workers concerned may make it very difficult for unions to gain access to them. Traditional trade unionism has trouble dealing with these new realities and the unions are fully aware of the risk leaving "atypical" groups of workers unprotected. In general, unions see a danger of individualisation and segmentation of employment relationships and employment and working conditions, and acknowledge the need to explore new forms of communication, organisation and representation to face these challenges.
Telework does not currently appear to be especially high on the social partners' agenda. In some countries, the partners' positions are clearer than in others, but in no case is it reported that teleworking is a particularly high-priority topic. In general, trade unions regard teleworking ambivalently, reflecting both the new opportunities that it creates and the risks that it involves. In Denmark , the Netherlands and Sweden , there has reportedly been a clear evolution of the unions' positions: Unions accept that teleworking generates favourable expectations among many workers who want a different working environment or a new balance between working time and free time.
However, unions are also aware of the risks that this new form of work organisation involves: A common union demand is to avoid any mandatory transfer of teleworkers into self-employment. For employed teleworkers, union demands are very similar to the provisions frequently laid down in collective agreements see above: In general, all trade unions consider that telework should be regulated more extensively, although there are differences on how to combine legislation and collective bargaining.
These differences partly relate to differing national regulatory frameworks, but are sometimes also present among different unions in the same country. In brief, some unions give priority to legislation in establishing regulations, so as to: Other unions consider that telework is still too undeveloped a phenomenon, and that legislative reform would immediately be overtaken by events. They are in favour of collective bargaining at company and sector level, without ruling out - once telework is more widespread and there is greater experience - the adoption of more general measures through multisectoral agreements or legislation.
At European level, over the past few years the European Trade Union Confederation has developed a generally constructive attitude towards teleworking, while recognising the potential problems raised. For example, in a document setting out 25 points on industrial relations in the information society , the ETUC states that" teleworking should neither be condemned out of hand nor glorified.
The crucial question is how it will be organised. The position of employers' associations is usually less clear than that of trade unions, because they generally consider that work organisation is a question which is the exclusive concern of companies. However, employers' organisations tend to take a positive view of telework: The position of employers' associations on regulation is usually very clear: Although trade unions and employers' associations often differ, in some countries there is a certain level of agreement on regulation of telework. In Portugal, the "Strategic Social Pact" , signed by the government and social partners, declares that telework can lead to instability if it is not regulated appropriately.
The government has agreed to begin consultations with the social partners to promote a new legislative framework for telework. In the Netherlands, the unions and employers' organisations represented in the tripartite Social and Economic Council have recently taken the position that the protection of teleworking employees should be analogous to that of "traditional" employees.
Telework should be given a place in the negotiation of regular terms and conditions of employment between employers and employees. The Council also takes a positive view of the opportunities for self-employment offered by telework, while noting that the protective scope of labour and social security legislation should not be undermined.
In Greece, the social partners have shown a positive view of new legislation on "atypical forms of work", including telework, adopted in , although differences persist on other related questions. In Norway, despite differences among the social partners, a "joint declaration on telework" was included in the latest revision of the "Basic Agreement" between the NHO employers' organisation and LO trade union confederation In the declaration, the two organisations agree on the existence of problems connected to teleworking, and express a common commitment to monitor closely the future development of teleworking through studies and dialogue.
A joint committee will look at different aspects of teleworking and propose changes to the existing legal framework and to collective agreements. There is still no clear picture regarding the development and uptake of telework in the EU Member States and Norway. Its expansion has probably been less than was predicted a decade ago. Official statistics do not generally take telework into account although they do not provide much information on other forms of work organisation either , and while there is much literature on teleworking, there is little research into its use as a form of work organisation, and even less into its effects on employment conditions or industrial relations.
Teleworking is a form of work organisation that has not yet been fully defined. Beyond the general two-pronged concept of work outside the traditional workplace and the use of telecommunications, a diversity of situations exists. While telework can be carried out from many different places, with different types of connection to companies' computer networks and for different periods of time, we feel that the key diversity lies in the legal status of teleworkers and the nature of the work performed.
The combination of these two factors creates a dual profile within which employment conditions vary greatly.
As mentioned above, some seven employment categories are reported from around Europe as being applicable to telework - employer, self-employed or independent worker, quasi-self employed worker, "coordinated" freelance worker, "employee-like person," employee and civil servant - as well as the homeworking category, whose legal status is unclear.
These various categories are intermixed with different types of occupations. The most "teleworked" occupations have two distinct profiles in terms of work content and status:. However, this void is not exclusive to telework, which is only a small part of a far more complex and probably far more problematic phenomenon.
The prevailing regulatory frameworks in most European countries do not cover the present complexities of the labour market and industrial relations. They were developed to deal with situations that now cover only part of the workforce, leaving the remainder seemingly unprotected.