TUC: Abusive use of zero-hours contracts is increasing

Friday, July 16th, 2021

A new study carried out by GQR for the UK’s Trades Union Congress (TUC, the counterpart of the AFL-CIO in the US) shows that many zero-hours contract workers (those whose contracts don’t guarantee any hours of work) are negatively impacted by one-sided flexibility at work.

  • More than eight in ten (84%) of zero hours workers have been offered shifts with less than a day’s notice.
  • Seven in ten (69%) have suffered cancellations at less than a day’s notice.

The TUC says the abusive use of zero-hours contracts has become more widespread since the Taylor Review, pointing to comparable GQR polling from 2017, which shows there has been a marked increase in short notice shift offers and cancellation.

  • 73% had been offered work at less than 24 hours’ notice.
  • Half (51%) of zero-hours workers reported having had shifts cancelled at less than 24 hours’ notice in 2017.

GQR designed and carried out the survey of 2,523 working people in Great Britain aged 16 and over. Fieldwork was conducted online with results weighted to the national profile of working people by age, gender, region, social grade, ethnicity, work status, work sector and experience of furlough.

The TUC release is available to read here.

Data tables for the poll are available to download here.

For more information, contact Peter McLeod, on Twitter @mcleodp or pmcleod@gqrr.com