WORKING TIME DIRECTIVE

The cost to business of red tape introduced since 1997 has spiralled by 46% to £30 billion. New laws governing data protection, maternity and paternity leave and other issues have cost businesses billions, according to the Burdens Barometer survey by the British Chambers of Commerce. European laws including the Working Time Regulations, which have cost business more than £10 billion since its launch five years ago, also helped push up costs, the study showed. British firms faced a red tape bill for an extra £9 billion in 2003 alone, the BCC claimed.

BCC Director General David Frost said British business could not compete with a £30 billion millstone around its neck. "Government must simplify the UK's regulatory framework and properly assess both the costs and the benefits of new regulations. Their own rules require them to do this," he said. A spokesman for the Cabinet Office dismissed the BCC's claims, saying UK entrepreneurs faced a better business and regulatory environment than in most member countries of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development.

The Working Time Regulations saved firms £13 million per annum by removing administrative burdens on businesses without removing employment protection, he said. The spokesman added that much of the extra cost identified by the BCC was represented by the value of the policies themselves in enhanced maternity rights for women, the minimum wage for 1.5 million workers, and better working conditions. The BCC was deliberately confusing those benefits with the "small proportion of costs" to business of administering such measures, the spokesman said.

The European Commission is taking the UK government to court for allegedly failing to enforce a directive that entitles employees to tea breaks. It further accuses the government of neglecting its working time rules, which unions say has cost staff millions of hours of leisure time. The Commission is taking its case to the European Court of Justice. A commissioner said the issues were "rest periods" and "undeclared working time" in the EU Working Time Directive.

Amicus, the UK's largest manufacturing, technical & skilled persons' union, complained to the EC about four years ago alleging the British Government was failing to introduce Working Time Directive rules. It charged that existing UK regulations encouraged employees not to take breaks at work, which are required by law. The law states employees should have breaks during the day as well as between each week or fortnight and longer breaks over the course of the year.

Roger Lyons, president of the Trades Union Congress and joint general secretary of Amicus, said, "As a result it is possible for workers to work 24/7 without a break and not breach regulations. Because of the climate of fear and downsizing in many workplaces, workers fail to take their legal entitlements to a tea break." Amicus says the government has failed to protect as many as three million white-collar workers from companies pressuring employees to do extra work at home.

Its second complaint centres on staff working voluntary hours, discounting the average of 48 specified in the directive. "While we welcome the legal action we would have rather the UK Government had chosen to apply the Working Time Directive by agreement," an Amicus spokesman said. "However, we have waited too long and there is now clearly no alternative."