European Unions Working Time Directive - Literature review Example

THE EUROPEAN UNIONS’ WORKING TIME DIRECTIVE By The European Unions’ working time directive The European Union’s working time directive was ratified in 1993 as a directive by the European Council to uphold the health and safety of employees in the labour force. Typically the directive included a lay down of minimum requirements with reference to working hours, period of rest, annual leave, and the workforce arrangement for night shifts (Dimitrakopoulos, 2013). The focus of this directive is on the practical use of working time. Description-wise, working-time refers to any period within which an employee is working at the employer’s disposal and executing his or her duties in accord with laws of practise (“What is the European”, 2009). The UK labour government first introduced the directive in 1998, which envisaged that over 3.5 Britons would benefit from the standard health and safety checks stipulated by the WTD directive (Dimitrakopoulos, 2013). The focus of this report is to exemplify the how the WTD represents the necessary safety measure to safeguard workers, its main provisions, and how the directive enhances labour market integration in Europe. The second segment will centre on an appraisal of if the WTD implementation undermines the single European labour market construction. Key Provisions The WTD provisions that are aimed to guarantee the health and safety of the workforce across Europe are contained in the European Commission directive’s article 3 to 9. Starting with Article 3, it endows workers with a daily rest entitlement that envisages a minimum day rest hours of eleven consecutive hours each day (Geyer, Mackintosh and Lehmann, 2005). In line with article 3, article 4 of the WTD directive provides a daily rest break within the 6-hour working day. Subsequently, Article 5 provides for a weekly rest that stipulates uninterrupted 24-hours of the rest period. Next is article 6 which provides for an average working time weekly including overtime works that should not exceed 48 hours. Article 7 provides an annual payable leave of four weeks. The regulation establishes a short-lived qualification period for the application of remunerated annual leave through the introduction of generous provisions. The other provision is article 8 that proffers night shift workers an entitlement to free and standard health assessment to ascertain that the conditions. Otherwise, Article 9 provides a possible transfer to day shift if it is established that there is a health concern in the night shift arrangements. These 9 articles and the inherent provisions are the European Union’s WTD that are designed to safeguard the health and safety of European workforce (Geyer, Mackintosh and Lehmann, 2005). The European Union’s WTD as a Necessary Measure in Protection of Workers The objective of the WTD regulation was to be a safety measure against the recognizable adverse effects on employees’ health and safety at that time due to the extremely long working hours (Ec.europa.eu, 2014). In order to provide such protection assurance, the WTD directive provides minimum constitutional rest and break entitlements, working arrangements for night-shift works, and annual leave provisions. Consequently, the directive is designed and structured in a way to that facilitates work-life balance by curtailing long working hours that initially was essentially stressful and destructive (Ec.europa.eu, 2014). The implication of this provision is that it will facilitate the reduction of cases where individuals drive while exhausted; a scenario that is carefully supposed to have same effects as driving while one is drunk. The drafters of the WTD directive envisaged a scenario where deviance will prevail and as a result provided safeguards to guarantee that the health and safety of workers (Barnard, Deakin & Hobbs, 2003). In consequence, the WTD regulation placed legal constraints on employers, which ensure that if the directive is not observed, the government of such nation is liable to a hefty financial penalties and potential sanctions by the European Union. Therefore, even if there are no exclusive rights to work for long hours, the WTD provides legal protection to safeguard worker’s rights within reasonable working environment and family-life friendly. The provisions then provide the following compensations. Firstly, an apparent benefit in upholding safety and health of workers is that employees are not forced into signing any contract under the opt-out clause, but only if they must commit themselves to extra time (Ricci, 2001). The availability of such protection curtails instances where an employer may compulsorily pressure a potential employee or the existing ones that they have no job if the decline to sign the opt-out clause binding. Consequently, employers will have no exclusive rights to blackmail potential or current employees, which was a prevalent scenario before the ratification of the WTD in Europe. This provision, therefore, provides safety against depression of workers that may result due to frustrations. Secondly, the health and safety of workers is guaranteed under the WTD directive and will improve progressively, as more and more European nations embrace the directive fully (Van Klaveren, Tijdens & Martin, 2007). Working for long hours often has some common detrimental illness such as muscular problems, stomach-aches, headaches, sleeping problems stress, and bad temper. Such illness will be reduced significantly through the WTD. The maximum 48 hours per week does not only foster worker’s health, but will also promote worker’s family responsiveness particularly those who have been working 60-hours a week (Boulin, 2006). Additionally, having a maximum of four-week leave will also be beneficial compared to the lesser holiday breaks that workers used to have before. In consequence, workers will be healthier and less stressed, a factor that will likely lead to improvement on worker’s efficiency and quality of work because they will feel fresh and ready for assignments. In fact, workers who are over-worked habitually find it very difficult to manage their expenditure due to lack of enough time to budget and spent. As a result, by limiting employees’ working hours to 48 hours ceiling a week will help avert them neglecting their financial obligations. Thirdly, another key provision of the WTD provision is to ensure health and safety is that the working time plans are set in a way to achieve gender equality, by providing that work arrangements do not reprimand women. Conventionally, inequality negatively affected women’s job security and career advancement since women we made to work on dead-end jobs and precarious contracts with fewer retirement fund and social security benefits (Springford, 2013). However, with the WTD’s entitlements, the approach can dynamically persuade men to contribute part of their time for family dealings. As a result, augmentation opportunities for all employees to work flexibly are a step by which more equity can be in working arrangements between both genders. Additionally, a key objective of the WTD is that the labour market ought to be in a way that is open-minded to the satisfaction of all workers. Correspondingly, further innovative working arrangements together with working-time accounts, can aid in securing working-time plans that encourage lifelong erudition and the growth of a stronger knowledge-based financial system. Collectively the WTD guarantees health and safety through promotion of active ageing work guides working arrangements and having in place a policy to retain the older workforce and allowing them to work for flexible or reduced hours. Does this directive enhance integration across the European single labour market? The working time guidelines have existed in the EU member states mostly for reasons relating to work-related safety, health, and wellbeing of workers in Europe. The directive also matters in terms of economic reasons in enhancing integration across EU’s single labour market. However, the wider gaps in the adoption of the directive among the EU nations continue potentially to constrain the integration as each state strives to achieve competitive advantage (Maslauskaitė, 2012). The objective of the single market is to create trust amongst EU’s national governments, workers, businesses, and regulators (Akman & Kassim, 2010). Therefore, to achieve this objective each country must cut off its tariffs to zero, its import quotas, and then harmonization of safety standards. Consequently, a complete single workforce market across states should have standard qualifications, unemployment insurance, and pensions (Maslauskaitė, 2012). The same harmonisation should also be invoked particularly on corporate and consumption taxes because often tax discrepancies distort trade. However, the EU court’s ruling allowed member states in many cases to heighten the EU regulation through additional rules (Dimitrakopoulos, 2013). These national laws vary among nations and have made it hard to integrate the single market because it goes against standard regulations envisaged earlier to enhance the single market success. From a purely economic point of view, it has been established by most economists that the EU single market trade has had little impact on work time guidelines (Springford, 2014). In this regard, the WTD directive has done little to integrate the single labour market. Does WTD implementation undermine the single European labour market construction allowing some social dumping? Apparently, and to a larger extent the WTD directive’s embrace of some aspects social dumping practices continue to undermine the development of a single EU’s labour market. Perhaps the best definition of social dumping in regard to the WTD directive is best brought out when considering the movement of workers within the European Union. In the provision of services, employers are permitted to send their workers from one member state to other within the EU as stipulated European Union legislations since 1996 (Adnett & Hardy, 2001). These particular sets of workers are as posted workers. Commonly, it is feared that cheap labour from less developed nations to other wealthier member states may accept working in poor conditions, a situation that is likely to lower the labour standards of the host nation. The posting of these workers is on the premise article 56 of the Treaty of European Union functioning and has safeguards in place to protect all posted workers and deter social dumping (Smith & Morton, 2006). In so doing, the directive requires that the European Union member-states ensure that all posted workers are to the host nations’ regulations (Maslauskaitė, 2012). The directive therefore set out an extensive arrangement of minimum liberties such as maximum work and minimum rest periods; minimum remunerated annual holidays, minimum pay rates and so forth. However, these rights are only a reflection of the prevailing conditions within the host country where the workers have been sent as opposed to their own country. Apparently, the WTD directive’s provisions are aimed at limiting the extent of social competition that was envisaged by the EU treaty function of the EU. The reality of the implementation of the WTD thus weakens the construction of the single EU labour market (Adnett & Hardy, 2001). It is paramount to remark that, even though there have been rules aimed at deterring the provisional social dumping forms existent for almost 17 years, the rules enforcements have never reached any threshold, actual the efforts have been appalling. In consequence, the EU’s posted workers are still perceived as a prime reality of social dumping practices. In addition, the practices of setting up the letter box firms within multiple member states that embrace the weaker standards have become apparently common (Maslauskaitė, 2012; De Vos, 2006). Therefore, the social dumping that involves the export of services from weak economies with poorly enforced labour laws, where exporters’ expenditures are lower than its competitors in high standard economies; do present the unfair competition advantage. These realities of implementations of the WTD directive thus undermine the efforts of development of single EU labour market (Bernaciak, n.d). In wrapping up this report, it overriding to note that though the objectives of the WTD directive have not been completely reached, its provisions have been crucial in safeguarding the safety and health of workers. Its key provisions such as the threshold working periods as discussed in this report elaborates the necessity of the WTD in protecting workers within the European Union. In terms of enhancing integration across Europe the directive has done little to embrace the single market of labour as envisaged by the EU Commission. As explained within, such is due to EU court’s ruling that gave the member states the liberty to add rules to the directive, thus disqualifying the universality rule. As with the implementation of the WTD, apparently as explained above it has worked more in threatening the survival of the single European labour market dream. The range of social dumping practices within the EU in the name of competitive advantage has further appalled the efforts for a single EU labour market construction. References Adnett, N., & Hardy, S., 2001. Reviewing the Working Time Directive: rationale, implementation, and case law. Industrial Relations Journal, 32(2), 114-125. Barnard, Deakin, & Hobbs. 2003. Opting out of the 48-Hour week: employer necessity or individual choice? An empirical study of the operation of Article 18 (1)(b) of the Working Time Directive in the UK. Industrial Law Journal, 32(4), 223-252. Bernaciak, M., n.d. Social Dumping and the EU Integration Process. SSRN Journal. Boulin, J. Y., (Ed.). 2006. Decent working time: New trends, new issues. International Labour Organisation. De Vos, M.., 2006. Free movement of workers, free movement of services and the posted workers directive: a Bermuda triangle for national labour standards?. ERA Forum, 7(3), pp.356-370. Dimitrakopoulos, D., 2013. Debates over the EU’s Working Time Directive epitomise the conflict between neo-liberal and centre-left visions of Europe.. [online] EUROPP. Available at: http://blogs.lse.ac.uk/europpblog/2013/04/24/debates-over-the-eus-working-time-directive-epitomise-the-conflict-between-neo-liberal-and-centre-left-visions-of-europe/ [Accessed 8 Feb. 2015]. Ec.europa.eu, 2014. Working Conditions - Employment, Social Affairs & Inclusion - European Commission. Available at: http://ec.europa.eu/social/main.jsp?catId=706&langId=en&intPageId=205 [Accessed 9 Feb. 2015]. Geyer, R., Mackintosh, A. and Lehmann, K., 2005. Integrating UK and European social policy. Abingdon: Radcliffe. Maslauskaitė, K., 2012. Social Competition in the EU: Myths And Realities. 1st ed. [ebook] Available at: http://www.eng.notre-europe.eu/media/socialcompetition-maslauskaite-ne-jdi-june13.pdf?pdf=ok [Accessed 9 Feb. 2015]. Ricci, G., 2001. BECTU: An Unlimited Right to Annual Paid Leave. Industrial Law Journal, 30(4), 401-408. Smith, P., & Morton, G., 2006. Nine years of new labour: neoliberalism and workers’ rights. British Journal of Industrial Relations, 44(3), 401-420. Springford, J., 2014. Is immigration a reason for Britain to leave the EU. Centre for European Reform. Springford, J., 2013. The UK and the single market. 1st ed. [ebook] Available at: http://www.cer.org.uk/sites/default/files/publications/attachments/pdf/2013/bal_comp_js_singlemkt_15march13-7103.pdf [Accessed 9 Feb. 2015]. Van Klaveren, M., Tijdens, K., & Martin, N. R.., 2007. Working time. What is the European Working Time Directive? : Department of Health - Management resources. (2009). Available at: http://webarchive.nationalarchives.gov.uk/+/www.dh.gov.uk/en/managingyourorganisation/workforce/workforceplanninganddevelopment/europeanworkingtimedirective/dh_077304 [Accessed 9 Feb. 2015]. Read More