Feedback

Lorry drivers

Alastair Kendrick’s article ‘Heavy load’ on among other things ‘self-employment’ in the haulage industry may have inadvertently given the wrong impression about the correct legal approach to tax status.

The statement that ‘unless the driver holds an operating licence and is carrying on their own haulage business they cannot be considered self-employed’ is simply incorrect and approaches tax status the wrong way.

The correct legal approach is to identify whether the ‘worker’ fulfils the necessary tests to be an employee. This follows the principles in Ready Mixed Concrete (South East) Ltd v Minister of Pensions & National Insurance [1968] 1 All ER 433. These held that a worker cannot in law be an employee without all three of the standard pre-requisites. The employment pre-requisites are:

• the obligation to provide a personal service;
• the obligation to be controlled in relation to...