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AAP
AAP
Politics
Jack Gramenz and Phoebe Loomes

NSW Labor to give rights to gig workers

Uber delivery drivers and casual employees will be able to claim compensation if injured at work and take entitlements from job to job, if Labor wins the NSW election.

New entitlements would make gig workers more resilient and the labour environment less precarious in general, the state opposition said on Sunday.

"The rise of the gig economy has revolutionised the way people can access work but that shouldn't mean workers should be left more vulnerable," leader Chris Minns said.

The plan would see the introduction of a workers compensation benefits scheme for gig workers similar to one other employees can already access.

Gig, disability and home care workers would also gain access to a portable entitlement scheme, allowing them to accrue leave and entitlements in their industry, rather than through their employer.

Portable entitlements would help prevent a predicted exodus of workers from the NSW disability sector, The Australian Services Union said.

NSW secretary Angus McFarland said the sector needed about 30,000 new workers in the next 12 months but around 50 per cent of the existing force plans to quit in the next five years.

"A big source of their pain is losing their entitlements every time they switch jobs, which tends to happen very regularly," he said.

The highly casualised nature of the disability sector meant support workers often performed multiple jobs and combine casual and part-time work.

One in four disability workers have been leaving their jobs every year, according to the federal government -three times more than the turnover in other healthcare or social sector jobs.

Labor says its proposals are a response to the rise of the gig economy and part of a broader, long-term plan to rebuild the NSW economy after it was ravaged by the COVID-19 pandemic.

The rollout of the reforms will be assisted by unions, the gig platforms themselves, business groups and academics.

Their announcement comes after seven food delivery drivers were killed on the roads in 2020, including Dede Fredy and Bijoy Paul, whose families sought additional workers' compensation payments.

The families received a payment from Uber's accidental death policy last year but the Transport Workers Union argued in August the cases demonstrated why workers compensation schemes needed reform.

"This won't just mean a fairer and more equitable system for gig workers - it will save lives on our roads," the union's NSW secretary said on Sunday.

The families could not access statutory compensation because no gig platform had hired the riders as formal employees, Labor said.

Yavyz Cikar, whose nephew Burak Dogan died in 2020, said the family was denied compensation.

"There is no amount to cover such a loss for the family, the only concern we have is (for) justice to be done," he told reporters.

"At last, we are seeing some movement coming from Labor ... we are looking forward to that."

Food delivery riders are also denied access to minimum rates of pay, sick and annual leave, and superannuation in NSW.

"Work has changed but our laws have not," Labor's Treasury spokesman Daniel Mookhey said.

"We need to act. We need to modernise our laws so they suit how people are working today."

The policy will also address a rise in insecure work in the disability, community and home care sectors in NSW.

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