" The purpose of this article is to focus on a very topical aspect of labour/employment law, namely that of its personal or relational scope, which is usually regarded as an individual one, but which we argue has a significant and largely neglected collective dimension. A first introductory section proposes a normative framework for this inquiry, arguing for a more inclusive approach to relational scope where collective labour rights are engaged and finding a basis for this approach in ILO Recommendation No 198. A second section demonstrates the way in which the relevant jurisprudence of UK labour/employment law has seemed to be out of accord with that normative approach. A third section demonstrates how the case law of the ECJ and CJEU has also in its own way been unsympathetic to claims that self-employed workers should be brought within the fold of collective labour law, particularly with regard to collective bargaining. A fourth section further develops a supranational perspective upon these arguments, concentrating on arguments and pronouncements emanating from the European Committee for Social Rights. A fifth section considers ways in which novel scenarios of differentiation between ‘labour' and ‘capital' are presenting themselves in the context of the so-called ‘gig economy', focusing on the very recent UK Employment Tribunal decision in the Uber case. A sixth concluding section expresses the hope that the article has opened up a largely untrodden path towards an authentically collective view of the debate about the personal scope of labour/employment law."

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