Uber Canada's legal department plays vital role in securing union partnership

The legal department at Uber Canada played a critical role in supporting the rideshare and delivery company’s recent agreement with United Food and Commercial Workers Canada, which will provide representation to Canadian drivers and couriers without unionizing workers. The landmark agreement gives over 100,000 workers on the Uber platform across Canada access to representation. It also supports government reforms to provide drivers and delivery people with new benefits and preserve the flexibility of their work.

The legal team at Uber Canada worked hand in hand with public affairs, as well as the mobility and delivery sides of the company to determine how the agreement should be structured.

“As in-house lawyers, our role isn’t simply to opine on questions, but to help move the business forward, given the interplay of our legal skills and deep knowledge of our products,” says Jeremy Millard, senior legal director at Uber Canada.

Having decided that a new approach was needed to support its workers, Uber Canada released a series of policy and research papers on the future of app-based work. While a number of interested parties came forward, Uber determined that the private sector union UFCW was best suited as a partner for this purpose, due to its vast experience with organization drivers and delivery people across the country since 2018.

“Like so many things at Uber, this agreement breaks new ground,” says Millard. “There was no Canadian precedent for what we were doing. As a result we had to think about how working under our agreement would unfold in the short, medium and long-term.” The unexplored territory offered the freedom and latitude to be innovative, Millard says.

The made-in-Canada agreement provides both representation and joint advocacy for government reforms. Under the agreement, UFCW Canada provides representation, at no cost, to drivers and delivery people facing deactivation or other account dispute issues.

Uber Canada and UFCW Canada will also jointly advocate for industry-wide legislative standards, including at least 120 percent minimum earning standard – a benefit fund that scales based on time spent on platforms, notice of termination, accident coverage and access to workers’ rights.

Speaking of the partnership, Millard says: “We’ve come together to find common ground and blaze a trail towards a better future for app-based workers.”

The legal department at Uber Canada continues to look for ways to improve the app and offer more support for drivers. Most recently, the team supported Uber’s launch of the Appeals Centre. This provides drivers and delivery people whose accounts were deactivated for safety or accessibility related issues with easy access to information including the reason for the deactivation, contact history from Uber’s support team, details of how the appeals process works, a ‘request appeal’ button, and easy access to upload relevant supporting information.

The team also launched a Privacy Centre which aims to make it easier for drivers to understand how Uber uses their data to enable convenience, safe transportation and deliveries, and how to manage settings.