Riding for Deliveroo - Resistance in the New Economy

This is a fantastic book. Definitely recommend.

Having had bad experiences with some of the speedy delivery folks on pushbikes when I lived in London (even on a green WALK signal) I was interested to read this book. I totally understood how under pressure they were while, at the same time, often feared for my life because it was less important to them than getting where they were going - which is a shocking state of affairs. The whole gig economy is an abusive nightmare that puts this kind of pressure on people every single day and I was fascinated to read about what it is like from someone living that life and trying to survive. This is a very readable book that is straight from the heart, passionate and articulate. The author discusses the gig economy in depth, illustrated by what he and his friends have been dealing with as they try to earn a decent living. To say that it is exploitative is an understatement. Even out in the country where I now live, you can see the negative effect this kind of practice has on the lives and the physical mental health of people trapped in the situation of having to work for these kind of employers in order to stay out of the dole queue and support themselves and their families. It was great to discover that many of these workers are joining forces and are beginning to fight back and demand a fairer and more balanced share of the income generated through these businesses. It is good to see, also, that the author is doing a PhD on the subject. The more this kind of thing and its consequences are 'out there' not just with the general public but with the alleged 'experts' - the more the workers can use that to their advantage to claw back some humanity in the workplace.

Those moped and bicycle couriers with their familiar turquoise cuboid backpacks that we see threading their way through traffic, are precarious not only in terms of their safety on the roads, but also in their employment status.  Deliveroo couriers are part of the 'gig economy,' that contract-less, piece meal (i.e. paid per task) type of employment that is becoming disturbingly prevalent in today's economy.Callum Cant is a former Deliveroo delivery worker and Ph.D. candidate at the University of West London.  In this book, he uses his experience as a Deliveroo courier to examine 'workerism' and possible socialist responses to the type of capitalistic and digital / algorithmic exploitation prevalent today.He chronicles the adrenaline fuelled, often dangerous conditions that Deliveroo workers face through his own first-hand experience, and the path from individual worker gripes and disaffection to nascent  organised dissent to first local, then national, then international activism including strike action and picketing.He illustrates this through parallels with other 'precarious worker' movements and activism  including dock workers and builders, and routes his arguments and theories in the writings principally of Marx and Engels.  He ends with a quote from Rosa Luxemburg, writing in 1915 from a German prison;"Bourgeois society stands at the crossroads, either transition to socialism or regression into barbarism."This is the writer's rallying cry, and it feels very timely as, at the time of writing, we are in the hands of a strengthened Tory government that has benefited from the collapse of Labour support, Brexit beckons, Australia is on fire and the Middle East looks set to plunge into a bloody new war.  As Callum Cant says, the stakes could not be higher.The grounding of the Delievroo experience in socialist and political theory and history was clearly done, necessary and enlightening, although I would have liked to hear more about Cant's Deliervoo experiences, and those of his colleagues.  It's also a shame that he is called away by a family emergency at the time of the strike he's been involved in creating, hence we lost an important part of first hand narrative.This remains though, an important and timely book, and a time of vapid and timid political thinking, argument and writing, its a refreshing dose of conviction.

I live by Westfield in London and am surrounded by a host of Deliveroo drivers taking orders from restaurants there. I had never used a Deliveroo service as always saw them as hugely exploitative, but now see I am a dream customer. They get their money and the chance of another job almost immediately.Right up front it is explained to you that the writer is a Marxist and that he has written the book following a 'workers inquiry' format. Oh no I thought, but not to worry the structure works really well.How great to have someone who can write so well and bring the whole thing to life.I am not massively political but believe we are living through the excesses of the internet revolution and this book, offers hope that if the workers can fight back there will be a more equable relationship between the organisations and the workers in a gig economy.Post the industrial revolution it took a very long time for legislation and workers rights to catch up.It is a fascinating document and I live in the hope that Callum Cant will become an enabler of using the technology to support the rights of the people who work on these delivery platforms.A very thought provoking and interesting book.

This is a great book, and so timely. Our employment landscape is changing and "gig economy" jobs are getting more and more common. As a rider, Callum has been trying to help organise other riders. This is important work. Labour organising needs to focus much more on precarious workers like this: people on zero hour contracts, people considered to be "self employed" by rapacious companies like Deliveroo and Uber, people who have language barriers. This book is a clear, vivid and persuasive contribution to the fight.