Euro businesses slam working time directive 'opt out' curb

UK and Polish business leaders have condemned the EU’s latest attempt to scrap the ‘opt-out’ of the Working Time Directive. In a joint report the UK Institute of Directors (IoD) and the Confederation of Polish Employers rejected the European Parliament’s revised proposals which they said would further damage UK and Polish competitiveness.

Miles Templeman, Director General of the Institute of Directors, said;

“For both our countries it is essential we maintain a flexible labour market to allow us to compete with emerging economies. We simply cannot afford to relax our competitive advantage in any way if we wish to continue to enjoy our current standard of living.”

Both organisations pointed out that the new proposals from the EU – to allow a three year extension of the opt-out which would then be reviewed by the Commission – is an unacceptable and undemocratic situation

Miles Templeman, said:

”After the three years, of course, the Commission can make an administrative decision and simply say ‘No’ to a request to extend the opt-out further. That quite frankly is a non-starter.”

The IoD, said that it had previously pointed out the fact that the opt-out is widely used by employers in the UK, with some 43% of business making use of the provision.

The Polish experience has been slightly different. Current Polish legislation does not allow for the option of using an opt-out. However the European Parliament’s proposal that the inactive part of ‘on-call’ time must be counted as working time would make the opt-out indispensable.