3rd January 2006

Happy New Year! Have you broken any New Year resolutions yet?  A popular resolution is to improve the work-life balance by spending more quality time with family and friends and fewer hours at work.  The Government may support you in this resolution as it has now made a U-turn on its stance regarding the opt-out provision in the working time directive. Despite early opposition, it now appears to agree that the individual worker’s right to opt-out of the maximum 48hr week should be phased out.  The Industry Minister, Alan Johnson, believes that until the opt-out is abolished, workers who agree to work more than 48 hrs a week should still not work more than 65hrs a week calculated over a three-month reference period.

Until recently, the UK supported the continuation of the opt-out and was the only European country to take advantage of the provision.  If the opt-out is to disappear, it will impact both employers and employees. Many employees, particularly at this time of year, rely on the extra pay they get from working longer hours – more money coming in to pay those Christmas bills. Similarly, employers in seasonal businesses may now have to hire more staff instead of relying on existing staff to work longer hours at peak times. Perhaps in a few years time Santa will have to employ a lot more reindeer to help him!

Joking aside, we mustn’t forget that the working time regulations are in place to safe guard employees’ health and safety.  This is illustrated by a recent case involving a pub landlord, Mr Hone. Mr Hone was expected to work excessive hours, and complained that he was occasionally working 90hrs a week. It was at a meeting called to discuss him signing an opt-out agreement, that he raised these concerns, and his employer agreed that he required an assistant manager to take on some of his workload. The assistant manager was never appointed and Mr Hone subsequently suffered stress related illnesses. He was unable to return to work and successfully sued his employer for compensation. In deciding that the employer had breached its duty to ensure Mr Hone’s health and safety at work, the court would have taken into account the fact that the employer expected him to work far in excess of the 48hr maximum working week. It was foreseeable that this breach of duty could lead to a psychiatric injury since the Working Time Regulations clearly regard 48hrs a week as the most someone should be expected to work.

So if it is coming up to 5 o’clock put on that lovely woollen scarf your mother-in-law bought you for Christmas, and go home!