The European Commission is urging the Dutch government to tackle the surge in people working as freelancers, reports Dutchnews.nl.

In its recommendations, the Commission said that the government should tackle remaining barriers to hiring staff on permanent contracts and address the high increase in self employment. They advised this should be done by reducing ‘tax distortions’ favouring self employment, without compromising entrepreneurship, and by promoting access of the self-employed to affordable insurance against unemployment and disability.

According to figures from the national statistics agency, CBS, 1.3 million people in the Netherlands do some sort of freelance work, often alongside a regular job. In total, almost 800,000 people rely solely or mainly on income from freelancing.