Not many can get by on zero-hours contracts

In the spring of last year, Operation Steady Job mobilised citizens to take a stand against zero-hours work. This movement was converted into an initiative signed by 62,516 people demanding that zero-hours contracts be prohibited by law. According to this citizens’ initiative, each employee should be guaranteed at least 18 hours of work per week, unless the employee specifically wants to work fewer hours.

The citizens’ initiative is now into its ninth month sitting with the Parliamentary Employment and Equality Committee. Committee Chair Tarja Filatov, a Social Democrat MP, reminds an impatient enquirer of the rules of procedure: Government proposals take precedence over citizens’ initiatives for the Committee. According to Filatov, Government proposals have taken a lot of time.

‘We will be able to concentrate on moving the objectives of the citizens’ initiative forward after Christmas,’ she promises.

The Committee has consulted a large group of experts from PAM alongside other trade unions and employer organisations, while also hearing from legal experts in labour law, among others. The latest entry on expert hearings is from 30 September.

Working group seeking a solution to zero-hours work

In an e-mail interview, Jari Lindström, Minister of Justice and Employment representing the Finns Party, tells PAM Magazine about a new tripartite working group launched at the turn of November and December.

‘The purpose is to explore the contents of labour law applicable to zero-hours contracts and other contracts involving irregular working hours and to assess any possible needs to amend legislation,’ Lindström describes the working group’s assignment. According to him, it is necessary to ensure the use of flexible working hours in the type of work where ‘demand for labour varies in an unforeseeable manner’, while also safeguarding the status of employees. The working group is in place until the end of March. The Government has scheduled its mid-term policy review session for April.

Lindström would not personally pursue a total ban on zero-hours contracts.

‘Even so, the ground rules ought to be fair and employment contracts must be balanced in terms of rights and responsibilities. An employee should be able to anticipate their future income level,’ he says.

‘If the [Committee] report on the citizens’ initiative concerning zero-hours employment contracts is completed during the working group’s assignment, it will be taken into account in its preparatory work,’ Lindström says.

Service Union United PAM has openly endorsed the citizens’ initiative made by Operation Steady Job to prohibit zero-hours contracts. In January, President Ann Selin was quoted in the PAMplus Magazine for active union members as saying that she hoped that Parliament would understand the everyday lives of working people and would decide the matter with a thought for the people, not the economy.

PAM Magazine surveyed zero-hours work

Only a quarter of people working on zero-hours contracts in service sectors have chosen this form of work themselves, reveals a PAM Magazine survey for zero-hours workers. The remaining 75% do zero-hours work involuntarily. The most common reason for this is that they would rather have a full-time job or at least a guaranteed minimum number of hours.

‘If this thing worked properly, I’d be free to decide when I want to work and when I need to have time off. However, this is not how it works and the boss decides on my hours simply based on what sort of day they are having when drawing up the rotas… I haven’t had any work at all for two months now,’ one of the respondents wrote.

A third of respondents have, on average, less than ten working hours a week. Half of this group, i.e. 16%, mostly have no working hours at all. Conversely, another 7% reported that they worked full-time – due to their zero-hours contracts, however, they did not have any guarantees that their work would continue. It is interesting that more than half of those with over 30 weekly working hours reported that they had been doing zero-hours work for more than two years. This does not give an impression of filling in for temporary uncertainties, which is frequently cited by employers as a reason for zero-hours contracts.

71% of respondents said that they had some or plenty of difficulties making ends meet. Only 20% of respondents reported that they were able to get by on their earnings. All the rest either require financial support from their personal networks or from unemployment or social security systems, or all of the above. In other words, when the earnings of a number of employees remain too low, it will also become costly for society. Problems with subsistence were naturally even more common among those respondents who had few or no working hours.

27% of respondents feel that they cannot refuse shifts, while another 31% can only do so for a very important reason. The majority of the remaining respondents state that they would no longer get any shifts if they refused once – one respondent even reports being the only employee at their workplace. Among these respondents, the flexibility of a zero-hours contract seems to work exclusively in favour of the employer.

18% of respondents have experienced problems with their unemployment security. Either the bureaucracy required to receive benefits takes too long, or they have too many or too few working hours in relation to what would qualify them for unemployment benefits.

Zero-hours contracts are often thought of as being a specific problem for young people and students. Based on the PAM Magazine survey, this is an over-simplified picture of the situation. Respondents do indeed include students, some of whom say that zero-hours work is a good fit for their current circumstances. However, 37% of respondents are aged over 35, while 15% have dependent children.

For its survey, PAM Magazine sought respondents working on zero-hours contracts in service sectors both in the Magazine and through online channels of the Magazine and PAM, as well as from Operation Steady Job’s Facebook group. The survey was conducted in October and November and 104 people responded. Of these, 35% work in hotel, restaurant and leisure services, 28% in the commercial sector, 13% in facilities services, including cleaning work, 12% in security services and the remaining 13% work in other service sectors or in more than one sector at the same time. Among these groups, the proportion of respondents working in hotel, restaurant and leisure services and in security services was clearly higher than the relative number of employees in these sectors as a whole, which means that zero-hours contracts under different names seem to be a typical feature of these sectors.