Taiwan People’s Party (TPP) legislators Lai Hsiang-ling (賴香伶) and Jang Chyi-lu (張其祿) are to sponsor a food delivery workers’ bill of rights with the aim of passing the law within the year.
Although the delivery platform industry has existed in Taiwan for nearly a decade, wages and working conditions are not regulated by a separate law, Lai told a news conference on Friday.
The Ministry of Labor last year began working on regulations governing the labor rights of delivery drivers, but disappointingly has made little progress since then, she said.
Photo: Liu Hsin-de, Taipei Times
Citing a labor dispute between Uber and drivers in February dubbed the “NT$40 chaos,” Lai said that drivers have to work longer hours and travel farther to offset pay cuts due to company policies that were not announced or discussed.
Drivers are spending more time and money to work while facing increased risk of traffic accidents, she said.
Democratic Progressive Party Legislator Fan Yun (范雲) and New Power Party Chairwoman Claire Wang (王婉諭) also support new legislation.
The number of people working as delivery drivers tripled from 45,000 in 2019 to 145,000 last year, even as drivers face opaque and unpredictable wage changes, Fan said.
The central government should not delay the creation of laws and regulations that protect delivery drivers, she said, adding that Taipei, New Taipei City, Taichung and Tainan have already passed ordinances to regulate the industry.
Food delivery cemented its place as an essential industry in Taiwanese society during the COVID-19 pandemic and delivery drivers need to be protected by some form of mandatory insurance, Wang said.
It is not appropriate that an industry is regulated by a myriad of local ordinances, but not national law, she said.
The changes made by delivery platforms to pay rates underscored the need for regulatory intervention to address the imbalanced relationship between employers and workers in the sector, she said.
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