Ivana Bacik (Dublin Bay South, Labour) | Oireachtas source

Last night in Dublin city centre and in Cork, we saw hundreds of delivery workers in high-vis gear on bikes take to the streets to strike and to protest against the exploitation they face because of the practices of online platforms like Deliveroo and Just Eat. We know that platform workers such as delivery drivers are paying a very high price for our convenience. These workers have been utterly exploited throughout the years and we have allowed a model to develop whereby cycling across the cities on the island come rail, hail or shine, they nonetheless still earn much less than the national minimum wage with many riders reporting that their payment is dropping to as little as €1 per hour. What is the Government doing to support them and why did it oppose the EU platform workers directive that should have been agreed before Christmas and that would have provided some rights and support for workers such as the delivery riders who took to the streets last night?

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