Depending on who you ask, the gig economy, in which workers set their own schedules at companies such as Uber, either liberates employees from the grind of wage-slavery — or recreates the exploitation of earlier centuries by putting workers at the mercy of capricious and exploitative companies.

A report on the future of work in the UK by Matthew Taylor, who was head of the Downing Street policy unit under Tony Blair, attempts to pick its way through this ideological and legal minefield. Its aim is to maintain the balance between dynamism and fairness in the British labour market. For the most part, it succeeds rather well, neither denying that exploitation exists nor calling for innovation to be snuffed out.

The report argues that, in general, greater clarity on rights and status is needed rather than a fundamental shift in law. It also notes that reform of the tax system could do a great deal to reduce the unfair treatment of workers — a point particularly in need of emphasis, given the unhappy fate of the last UK government proposal on this front.