Milan prosecutor Paolo Storari has ordered a judicial review of Deliveroo , the food delivery giant, following his investigation into Glovo, again for gangmastering of riders. In this case , between 3,000 and 20,000 workers in Milan and nationwide were allegedly exploited, paid below the poverty line and taking advantage of their poverty.

The judicial administrator will have to work to regularize their positions. The company and its sole director are under investigation.

In the 60-page urgent order (which will have to be evaluated by a preliminary investigations judge), prosecutor Storari, who has been conducting similar investigations for years in the logistics, transport, fashion, and private security sectors, states that the company Deliveroo Italy srl, based in Milan, is registered and that the sole director Andrea Giuseppe Zocchi is under investigation for gangmastering .

The riders (3,000 in Milan and 20,000 nationwide), according to the indictment, were allegedly paid wages "in some cases up to approximately 90% lower than the poverty line and collective bargaining agreement." These sums also violate the Constitution, as they cannot guarantee a "free and dignified existence."

Deliveroo and its CEO are said to have adopted a "business policy that explicitly disregards the need to comply with the law." Labor exploitation, the prosecutor writes, based on findings by the Carabinieri Labor Inspectorate, has been "perpetrated for years." This illegality must "end as soon as possible."

Hence the appointment by the Public Prosecutor's Office, headed by Marcello Viola, of judicial administrator Massimiliano Poppi for Deliveroo Italy, to "proceed with the regularization of the workers."

On February 19 , investigating judge Roberto Crepaldi validated the order by prosecutor Storari, who had ordered, again on an emergency basis, a judicial review of Foodinho, a Milan-based delivery company of the Spanish giant Glovo , which had been the focus of investigations into gangmastering. According to the prosecution, 40,000 delivery drivers employed throughout Italy were exploited. These "workers, formally self-employed under a flat-rate scheme," but "in reality, should be considered fully employed workers: by taking advantage of their state of need, they would have earned an annual net income below the poverty line."

The testimonies

I start the service by logging into the app at 11 am and finish at 10 pm. I work 7 days a week for about 11 hours a day, and my pay isn't enough. For this reason, I take on a second job as a porter in a hotel, working 5 days a week from 11 pm to 7 am. Unfortunately, I have to send around 600 euros to my large family who lives in Nigeria .

This is just one of the many testimonies of rider "exploitation" reported in the judicial review order for gangmastering against Deliveroo. Documents and statements from dozens of riders reveal that workers earn between 3 and 4 euros per delivery. One of them stated that he has to travel "up to 150 km" a day for "ten deliveries." Orders arrive directly via "notification on an app."

The reconstructions reported in the Milan Prosecutor's Office's order are essentially identical to the Glovo case, in which prosecutor Storari highlighted an "algorithmic management of work performance," constant "monitoring" of delivery times and performance, complete with "punishments." There's also an element that remains unclear at this time: how the data is processed to assign orders and, more importantly, calculate compensation.

Access to work, in fact, as evidenced by testimonies and investigative analysis, "occurs by logging into the platform," and once connected, the rider "receives orders" from the app . Some workers manage to earn "around €1,100 a month," others no more than "€500-€600" and cannot "afford," as one of them explained, "to refuse deliveries to support their wife and children in Afghanistan." And again: "Deliveroo monitors my movements via GPS." Performance is then evaluated via the platform for "productivity, attendance, and continuity." Another rider summed it up like this: "The app's algorithm does everything."

(Unioneonline)

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