Uber must face driver's lawsuit related to independent contractor dispute, California's supreme court rules

• An Uber Eats driver sued the company in 2019, arguing drivers should be classified as employees.
• But Uber said he'd signed a contract which meant employment disputes couldn't be taken to court.

Uber must face a lawsuit brought by an Uber Eats driver, the California Supreme Court ruled on Monday, in what could be an important win for labor rights.

Uber Eats driver Erik Adolph first sued the company in 2019, arguing that it misclassified drivers as independent contractors rather than employees — meaning he wasn't paid under the state's laws on minimum wage and overtime, the Los Angeles Times reported.

But then Uber claimed that because Adolph signed a contract that said such disputes must be settled in arbitration, he couldn't lead a court case on behalf of other drivers.

That relates to California's Private Attorneys General Act (PAGA), which allows workers to sue on behalf of the state for labor law violations.

And so Uber drivers wouldn't be able to bring employment-related disputes to court, the company argued.

But the California Supreme Court has now ruled unanimously that Adolph couldn't sign away his right to do this, so Uber will have to face the lawsuit.

Theane Evangelis, a lawyer for Uber, said in a statement emailed to Insider: "We are considering our appellate options."

She added that it contravened the US Supreme Court's ruling in a case involving Viking River Cruises, which determined companies could force PAGA claims into arbitration.

But Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor previously said, in relation to PAGA, "California courts, in an appropriate case, will have the last word," per the LA Times.