Employment status workers!

Employment-based workers

The continued high temperature has continued to heat up the topic of protecting the rights and interests of outdoor workers, including the issue of high-temperature protection for workers in new employment types such as takeaway riders and delivery boys: Do they get heat allowance? How to reasonably reduce their labor intensity in hot weather? If heatstroke occurs at work, can it be considered a work-related injury and be compensated?

The main reason for the problem is that it is difficult to identify labor relations among workers in new industries, and it is difficult to provide evidence to identify occupational heatstroke injuries. According to the current regulations on work-related injury insurance, labor relations are the prerequisite for identification of work-related injuries. Due to the flexibility of work for workers in the new employment form, and the fact that platforms often use outsourcing, crowdsourcing, cooperative employment and other forms of employment, the determination of labor relations is complicated. At the same time, in the identification of occupational heatstroke injuries, these workers need to prove that the stroke was caused by hot weather operations. However, most workers in new industries have free working hours and irregular working locations, which greatly increases the number of workers. Difficulty in proving work-related injuries.

To solve this practical dilemma, some new ideas and measures must be adopted.

First, we must break through the traditional thinking that labor relations are the prerequisite for the identification of work-related injuries, and include workers with new employment forms into the scope of work-related injury protection.

According to statistics, the number of workers in my country’s new employment form will exceed 100 million, and has become an important force supporting the development of the new economy. However, under the existing labor law system, these workers find it difficult to obtain legal protection due to ambiguous labor relations. This requires us to break the fixed thinking of traditional labor relations and include workers in new employment forms within the scope of legal protection.

In the "Guiding Opinions on Safeguarding the Labor Security Rights and Interests of Workers in New Employment Forms" jointly issued by eight departments including the Ministry of Human Resources and Social Security and the All-China Federation of Trade Unions, employment in new employment forms has been identified as incomplete. The situation of labor relations requires enterprises to assume corresponding protection responsibilities for the rights and interests of these workers, including occupational injury protection responsibilities. This provides a policy basis for the identification of labor relations for workers in new employment forms.

At the same time, the practice of appropriately loosening labor relations and work-related injury insurance in the construction field can provide useful reference for occupational injury protection for workers in new employment forms. This exploration also means that as long as workers are engaged in paid social labor, they should receive occupational injury protection.

In addition, in order to prevent platforms from artificially complicating employment relationships and making it difficult to identify work-related injuries, it is urgent to upgrade these policies and regulations into a legal system to ensure that the policies are truly implemented.

The second is to reasonably allocate the burden of proof for identifying occupational heat stroke injuries.

In the identification of occupational heatstroke injuries, the burden of proof for workers in platforms and new employment forms should be reasonably set based on the different abilities and circumstances of grasping and obtaining evidence. Since the platform has the technology and capabilities for online management, it should bear the burden of proof on workers’ working hours, working locations and working conditions. In addition to providing evidence and medical certificates proving the relevant labor relationship, workers in the new employment form must also secure online evidence in a timely manner to safeguard their legitimate rights and interests.

Third, the platform must fulfill its own labor security responsibilities.

Platforms must participate in work-related injury insurance or occupational injury insurance in accordance with the law. In hot weather, the algorithm should be optimized to reasonably dispatch orders and set delivery times, appropriately reduce the labor intensity of workers, and ensure that they have a certain amount of rest time in high temperatures to prevent the occurrence of occupational heat stroke. If a worker suffers from occupational heatstroke, the enterprise must provide timely treatment and assume corresponding work-related injury insurance responsibilities in accordance with regulations. In addition, enterprises must provide high temperature allowances to workers in accordance with regulations to reflect humanistic care for workers.

Fourth, labor inspection departments and others must effectively perform their duties.

The Ministry of Human Resources and Social Security, the All-China Federation of Trade Unions and other departments jointly issued a document calling for strengthening the protection of workers’ rights and interests in hot weather. Human resources and social security departments at all levels must strengthen supervision and monitor the implementation of laws and policies on platforms. Carry out supervision and inspection, urge the platform to effectively implement the provisions of laws and policies, promptly accept complaints from workers, and unblock various relief channels for workers’ high-temperature labor protection; trade union organizations at all levels must also actively play their functional roles to make it more convenient and considerate This way brings coolness in summer to workers.