Around 150 staff at the Curzon, which has six sites including Chelsea and Knutsford, and 100 staff at the Everyman are employed on the contracts that leave staff without guaranteed hours of work from week to week.
In 1999 the company was forced to pay £106,000 in compensation to staff employed on the contracts after staff were made to clock off and stand around in stores unpaid until business picked up.
The Labour MP for Corby and East Northamptonshire, Andy Sawford, wrote to the ONS this month asking it to change the way it calculates its data after a survey by the Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development CIPDD) estimated that 1 million people were employed on the contracts, which guarantee no set hours.
Nearly 4,000 people are directly employed on the contracts by Welsh councils, with Powys council the biggest user of them.
More than 700 people at 17 councils are employed on the contracts, which allow authorities to hire staff but with no guarantee of work, the BBC has found.
A4e added that just five staff members were employed on the £1m contract and it made up just 0.5% of the company's total revenues.
"People employed on these contracts earn £300 a week less, on average, than workers in secure jobs.
The picking off of critics, who national newspapers no longer employ on full-time contracts but phone up for £60 a pop, has been going on for years.
Instead, I am an expendable worker employed on a contract where the university's needs are met, but mine are not.
Currently, three months after the trial, Linda is employed on a normal contract in the same business.
