Prof Nicola Countouris is the Director of the Research Department at the European Trade Union Institute (ETUI) in Brussels and a Professor in Labour Law and European Law at the Faculty of Laws of University College London (UCL). He is a prolific author having written or co-written some 55 publications, including the definitive work “The Legal Construction of Personal Work Relations” co-authored with Mark Freedland (who was Nicola’s PhD supervisor) and published by Oxford University Press in 2011. He has acted as an independent expert for the International Labour Office, the ETUC, and on a number of European Commission funded projects. Nicola’s role at the ETUI, an independent research and training centre of the European Trade Union Confederation (ETUC), places him at the cutting-edge of regulatory debates aimed at strengthening the social dimension of the European Union