Flooding expected as rain sweeps in
Homes in Scotland could be hit by floods as a band of heavy rain is set to hit the UK in the coming days.
Scotland will be worst hit by thedeluge,and120mmofwater is set to fall over a 36-hour periodtodayandtomorrowforareasincludingperth,stirling,and Dumfries and Galloway.
An amber weather warning for rain likely to cause flooding and travel disruption is in place for these regions until midday tomorrow.
Themetofficehasalsoissued a yellow warning for wind covering Scotland and Northern Ireland, where gusts of up to 50mph are expected today.
Untiltomorrow,spellsofsunshine and rain are expected for most of the nation – a combination likely to bring "plenty of rainbows"accordingtothemet Office.
Met Office spokesperson Oli Claydon said a band of showers concentratedincentralareasof England, and covering parts of east Wales and south-east Scotland,wouldgraduallyebbaway lastnight,leavingscatteredsunny spells in its wake.
But heavier rain was to return overnight, which concentrated in Scotland and north-western areas before moving south-eastwards as it weakens over today and tomorrow.
Mr Claydon said mid-teen temperatures are expected to continue across the nation, which seem "especially warm" following the recent freezing weather.
"We're getting milder and wetter air from the west causing warmer weather all round, but we're a way off hitting a February record," he said.
"These mild temperatures are set to stick around through the week with peak temperatures of 14C and 15C in southeast England."
Mr Claydon said the average maximum temperature
for February was recorded as 21.2C in 2019.
The warm streak is set to continuethroughtheweekandinto theweekend,whichisexpected to be more "settled and sunny" across the board.
The heavy rainfall forecast today and tomorrow comes as flooding caused travel disruption across the UK over the weekend, including in Perth and Kinross where roads near the River Isla were closed.
Areas of England and Wales hit by floods over the weekend where some homes were evacuated can expect lighter rain in the coming days.
Scotland’s justice secretary Humza Yousaf has moved to reassure women with concerns over his controversial Hate Crime Bill by suggesting the Scottish Government would print “detailed explanatory notes” on freedom of expression provisions when the final legislation is published.
At an emergency 90-minute meeting of Holyrood’s justice committee yesterday, Mr Yousafwaspushedtoofferreassurances to those who do not believe in gender identity theory and have raised fears they could be criminalised for making statements such as “sex is immutable”and“awomendoes nothaveapenis”whendiscussing legal reforms to the Gender Recognition Act.
Around 600 submissions were received by the committee over the weekend after it asked for views on four options on how freedom of expression provisions should be written in the Hate Crime Bill.
Two would allow “discussion and criticism” of all the characteristics listed, while the other two would also permit expressions of “antipathy, dislike, ridicule and insult” on the grounds of religion only.
Thecallforsubmissionscame on Friday after Mr Yousaf had withdrawn previous government amendments in the wake of a backlash by young SNP members over how transgender people would be affected by his proposed change. The change had said “behaviours and materials are not to be taken as threatening or abusive solely on the basis that it involves or includes discussion or criticism of matters relating to transgender identity”.
The committee heard from the Faculty of Advocates, the Law Society, Inclusion Scotland, Black and Minority Ethnic Infrastructure in Scotland, Engender, the Evangelical Alliance and the Humanist Society about how detailed freedom of expression provisions should be in the Bill.
A concern was also raised thatbybeingspecificastowhat could or could not be said, the Bill could give the green light to people to use more hateful language.
However, testimony about how women are being accused of hate by discussing how gender identity impacts on sexbased rights from Lucy Hunter-blackburn of MBM policy group and Susan Smith of For Women Scotland appeared to sway Mr Yousaf.
After five years of resistance in four different courts, Uber lost its claim last week that its taxi drivers were customers, not workers.
In a shameful statement after the UK Supreme Court decision was announced, Uber asserted that the ruling only affects the 25 claimants who lodged the case at an employment tribunal in 2016. Rubbish. The judgement goes to the very root of the Uber business model and the 60,000 drivers who work for it across the UK. It has ramifications for the company in the 71 other countries it operates in as well.
It will also have an impact on the wider gig economy which has spiralled out of control since the last recession, and which has prospered during the pandemic as the switch to online shopping and home delivery has skyrocketed.
It was in the face of these trends that back in 2018 the SNP government set up an Expert Advisory Panel on the Collaborative Economy – the polite name for the gig economy. Remarkably, the Scottish Government chose Uber to be among its expert advisers.
The panel recommended the establishment of an “agile regulatory environment for the collaborative economy” and called for incubator and accelerator units to increase the supply of gig economy businesses in Scotland. It looks like another example of bad political judgement by the SNP.
We know the number of working people classified as self-employed in Scotland has risen to over 330,000. That’s a jump of 20 per cent in a decade. Some of that growth will be the result of newly inspired entrepreneurship, but it’s fair to say much of it will be enforced by the changes to employment practices now confronting anyone selling their labour. We also know, as last week’s Supreme Court ruling shows, many of those will be in bogus self-employment.
In the Uber case, what the court was interested in was how much control was exercised by the business over its drivers.
It found Uber set the taxi fare and so the driver’s remuneration, set the contract terms between the company and the driver without the latter having sight of those terms, let alone giving consent, stipulated the model and make of vehicle which could be used, took disciplinary action against drivers who turned hires down, described in Uber speak as being “removed from the platform” or
“deactivation”. Judge Lord Leggatt found these measures were “designed to operate coercively”. Uber as part of the arrangement also sacked workers who received poor customer ratings. The drivers were in the eyes of the court in a “position of subordination”. There was an element of compulsion, even coercion in the disciplinary code. In classic employment law terms, they were in a master-servant relationship.
Not only does last week’s landmark case mean Uber will now have to recognise their drivers as workers and so abide by national
minimum wage and working-time regulations, including paid holiday entitlement. The company will also be responsible for pension contributions and come within the scope of work-related equality and discrimination statutes: one of the claimants is seeking protection for whistleblowing under the 1996 Employment Rights Act.
Speculation has now switched to whether Uber will also be liable to pay 20 per cent VAT on fares, which could mean an outstanding, estimated tax liability of £1 billion. The company already books commissions through Holland as a tax-avoidance manoeuvre, indeed it was Uber BV registered in the Netherlands that was cited in the court judgement.
Not unusually a company with unlawful working practices, hiring workers on poverty pay, disregarding health and safety laws, also appears to have an unethical approach to its tax returns as well. It’s what Thomas Carlyle referred to as “vulturous greediness”.
There are some peculiarities to Uber’s methods for the control of its workforce. The ordinance that direct communications between driver and passenger are kept to a bare minimum, with the exchange of contact details strictly prohibited is by any measure extreme.
But many of the tests the Supreme Court set will now be applied to other platform companies in the gig economy. One of the useful lessons of the Uber case is the reminder that contractual provisions cannot over-ride statutory rights.
The Uber ruling also demonstrates the importance of trade unions. Workers can have all the rights in the world, but without a union to enforce them they count for nothing. That should not mean an indecent five-year wait in the courts, but immediate redress through negotiation by trade unions with businesses.
The Uber case serves to remind us that the real division in society is not between Scotland and England but between exploiters and exploited.
There has been an emergent class of workers on temporary contracts, on zero-hours, some hired through agencies, others processed through umbrella companies, all with intermittent income and so unlimited insecurity.
These workers are engaged especially in the gig economy, but they can be found in the public sector as well. We know that one care worker in ten in Scotland is on a zero-hours contract.
It is imperative that we tackle these precarious forms of work as we emerge from the pandemic.
But we need to have wider horizons too. I can’t help thinking that last week’s ruling also highlights the relevance of the ethical socialist argument for the extension of the democratic principle to the workplace. One day we may not have to welcome as glad tidings a court declaration that there is a position of subordination between a person and the business they work for in order to obtain justice.
Imagine if, rather than hired hands, people were treated as participants and citizens in the sphere of work. That really would help us build a stronger future than our present with its deep-rooted inequalities of power.
How much better a truly collaborative economy would be in place of the sham exposed at Uber.
Richard Leonard is a Labour MSP for Central Scotland
It is imperative that we tackle precarious forms ofworkinthe gig economy, writes Richard
Leonard