肺炎疫情肆虐一年，持續限聚令百業蕭條，但送餐中介業務卻如雨後春筍。短短數年間，內地最大食品外送平台美團，市值已發展至約1.7萬億港元，香港foodpanda、Deliveroo、 Uber Eats等不同送餐平台，亦提供了近5萬個就業職位，一季營收可達80 億港元。然而，作為逆市下最蓬勃發展的行業之一，與送餐員相關的交通事故亦急速上升。
如何避免「以命送餐」？
2020年首11個月，香港涉及單車及電單車的交通意外較2019年同期增加三成至5369宗，多位送餐員受傷，甚至命危。然而相關外送平台往往毋須負責，僅透過小量保險作有限援助，甚或「出於人道主義」，僅發放數千慰問金了事。到底為什麼送餐員成為高風險行業？欠缺工會的送餐員群體，安全又該如何獲得保障，避免「以命送餐」的悲劇不斷出現？
過去社會對外賣平台的批判，多集中於它有否以「自僱」之名，把企業責任一併外判，又或它有否剝削員工，過度壓縮送餐時間，致使靠多勞多得取酬的送餐員，被迫「以身犯險」，把駕駛速度推至極限。外賣平台的企業責任自不待言，然而，眾多評論者卻少有關注企業以外，作為外送經濟受益者的送餐員與政府，有何角色與責任。
對基層而言 自僱身分實是雙面刃
雖然近來僧多粥少的競爭，令送餐員收入持續下降，但送餐員這幾近沒有門檻、時間有彈性的工作，仍然是不少失業者的救命稻草。對基層而言，自僱身分實是雙面刃，它之所以容許低入行門檻，正正源於企業聘用員工時不受體能與保險的掣肘，也沒有福利過多、尾大不掉的顧忌。
對政府而言，民間自僱服務日趨盛行，既解決了失業率高企，引發社會動盪的隱患，政府亦能從企業盈利中獲得豐厚稅收，一舉兩得，故一般樂見其成。宏觀來說，外賣平台正正是高度市場化下，企業彈性聘用、員工彈性流動的典型例子。外送平台的興起，為社會帶來自由與機遇，但也誘使企業以剝削員工保障來追逐利益最大化。基層雖能解一時困境，長遠而言，他們失去了連續的生涯敘述，自僱制度亦侵蝕了傳統以來重視員工對企業的信賴、忠誠及互相付託的人文精神。
社會保險促使企業與送餐員團結
正如亞里士多德所言：「善常存兩惡之間，一種惡為過度，一種惡為欠缺。」政府無所作為，令基層毫無議價能力和福利保障，固然不當；政府過度管制，令企業「少做少錯」，扼殺基層僅有的謀生空間，亦非上策。針對外賣員欠缺保障的問題，政府實可考慮鼓勵設立社會保險（Social insurance），讓不同持份者共同分擔風險。現時送餐員均以個人身分提供服務，彼此沒有工會連結，亦沒有相互幫助的義務。對此，社會保險能促使企業與各送餐員團結一致，讓健全者支援不幸傷亡者，企業亦能間接扶助前線員工，彼此在無形中相互依存，共同承擔整個行業的風險與命運。
在香港，社會保險並非新事物，但較少用於員工保障之上。常見如保障消費者的旅遊業印花稅制度、分擔循環再造成本的生產者責任計劃（電子廢物徵費）、從源頭防止濫用的塑膠購物袋收費計劃等政策措施，民間則有倡議公平貿易的咖啡產品。消費者均願額外付費或承擔溢價，以達至環保、扶貧或分攤共同風險等不同目的，從而與弱勢社群、其他消費者，乃至地球整體構成命運共同體。
世界各國亦開始透過社會保險，為送餐員提供不同程度的保障，但此責任更多被歸於外送平台。例如，日本Uber Eats 外送員勞動組合便積極爭取，成功讓外送平台Uber Eats建立「傷害補償制度」，意外受傷或身亡的送餐員能分別獲最多25 萬日圓（約1.85 萬港元）及1000 萬日圓（約74 萬港元）的慰問金；法國的巴黎獨立送餐員團體（Collectif des Livreurs Autonomes Parisiens，CLAP）則發動連串遊行，逼令Deliveroo為送餐員提供免費醫療保險，報銷基本報銷額200%醫療費和住院費。國內沒有類似的送餐員工會，政府規定相關車輛購買交通意外保險，而送餐員自身安全，則靠外賣平台自律購買的人身意外保險提供保障。
良心消費 各方共贏
世上沒有免費午餐，關鍵問題是：「誰付鈔？」（someone has to pay）。要為送餐員安全提供合理保障，外送平台及消費者便需要共同承擔。縱使，社會保險會為外送經濟帶來額外成本，但企業能以此洗脫「剝削員工，強迫以命送餐」的惡名，實踐實惠的社會責任，消費者亦需要明白，方便的服務，需要為提供服務的人士的安全有所貢獻，作良心消費，真真正正做到共創（co-creation）、共享（co-sharing）的各方共贏局面。
梁亦華、陳之翰、葉兆輝 (2021.02.04)︰〈設「社會保險」保障送餐員權益 企業與消費者共擔責〉，《明報》，B09 觀點。
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A year of pandemic restrictions devastated large parts of the economy, yet food delivery platforms expanded at extraordinary speed. In only a few years, Meituan, mainland China’s largest food delivery platform, grew into a company valued at roughly HK$1.7 trillion. In Hong Kong, platforms such as foodpanda, Deliveroo and Uber Eats together created close to 50,000 jobs, with quarterly revenues reaching HK$8 billion. Yet alongside the rapid expansion of one of the few booming sectors during the downturn came a sharp rise in traffic accidents involving delivery riders.
How, then, can society prevent riders from “delivering meals with their lives at stake”?
During the first eleven months of 2020, traffic accidents in Hong Kong involving bicycles and motorcycles rose by 30 per cent year-on-year to 5,369 cases. Many delivery riders were injured; some suffered life-threatening accidents. The platforms themselves, however, rarely bore substantial responsibility. Most provided only limited insurance coverage or token compensation, sometimes framed merely as gestures “on humanitarian grounds”. The deeper question is why delivery work has become such a high-risk occupation, and how a workforce with little union representation can secure meaningful protection before more tragedies occur.
Public criticism of food delivery platforms has largely focused on whether companies evade employer responsibilities by classifying riders as self-employed contractors, or whether the relentless compression of delivery times effectively forces riders — paid according to the number of orders completed — to push themselves to dangerous limits on the road. The corporate responsibilities of delivery platforms are undeniable. Yet far less attention has been paid to the roles and responsibilities of others who benefit from the delivery economy, including riders themselves, consumers and government.
For many working-class people, self-employment is both opportunity and trap. Competition among riders has intensified in recent years, steadily eroding incomes. Even so, delivery work — with its low barriers to entry and flexible hours — remains a lifeline for many unemployed workers. The very flexibility that makes such work accessible also stems from the absence of conventional employment protections. Platforms can recruit without the obligations attached to physical assessments, insurance liabilities or long-term staff welfare.
Governments, too, often view the expansion of self-employed services favourably. The growth of gig work absorbs unemployment pressures that might otherwise fuel wider social instability, while profitable platforms generate substantial tax revenues. Seen from a broader perspective, food delivery platforms embody the logic of highly marketised economies: flexible hiring for companies, flexible labour mobility for workers. The sector undoubtedly creates opportunity and convenience. Yet it also encourages firms to maximise profits by weakening labour protections. Workers may escape immediate hardship, but over time they lose any stable sense of career continuity, while the self-employed model steadily erodes older ideas of loyalty, trust and mutual obligation between employer and employee.
As Aristotle observed, virtue lies between excess and deficiency. A government that does nothing leaves vulnerable workers without bargaining power or welfare protection. Yet excessive regulation may lead companies to retreat into caution, shrinking one of the few remaining sources of income for the working poor. Neither extreme offers a workable solution.
A more balanced approach would be for the government to encourage the creation of social insurance schemes through which risk is collectively shared among stakeholders. At present, delivery riders operate as isolated individuals. They lack union ties and bear no formal obligations toward one another. Social insurance could create a structure that binds platforms and riders into a more interdependent community, allowing healthier workers to support those injured or killed on the job, while enabling companies to contribute indirectly to the welfare of frontline staff. Risk and responsibility would no longer fall solely on individuals, but be distributed across the industry as a whole.
Social insurance is hardly unfamiliar in Hong Kong, though it has seldom been applied directly to labour protection. Existing examples include the travel industry levy that protects consumers, producer responsibility schemes such as electronic waste charges, and the plastic shopping bag levy designed to curb environmental waste at source. Fair trade coffee initiatives in the private sector operate on similar principles. In each case, consumers accept additional costs in pursuit of broader social aims — environmental protection, poverty reduction or collective risk-sharing — recognising a degree of shared responsibility with vulnerable groups, other consumers and society at large.
Other countries have already begun extending forms of social insurance to delivery riders, though responsibility often remains centred on the platforms themselves. In Japan, the Uber Eats Union successfully pressured Uber Eats into establishing an injury compensation scheme, under which injured riders may receive condolence payments of up to ¥250,000, while families of deceased riders may receive up to ¥10 million. In France, the Paris-based riders’ collective Collectif des Livreurs Autonomes Parisiens organised protests that compelled Deliveroo to provide free medical insurance covering hospitalisation and extended healthcare costs. Hong Kong lacks comparable rider unions. Current policy merely requires relevant vehicles to carry traffic accident insurance, while riders’ personal safety depends largely on whether platforms voluntarily purchase accident coverage.
There is no such thing as a free lunch. The central question is simple: who pays?
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