UK staff work longest hours in Western Europe
Staff in the UK are still working the longest hours in Western Europe, a report has shown. The European Foundation for the Improvement of Living and Working Conditions shows that full time employees in the UK put in 41.4 hours of work per week on average: a total of 1 hour and 24 minutes more than the average for all EU countries.
The maximum working week in the UK is currently 48 hours per week. There are 17 other countries in the EU where this figure applies. The remainder of the EU countries have a working week of no more than 40 hours. However, the longer working times demonstrated in Bulgaria and Romania mean that the UK does not fall at the bottom of the working hours league table for all EU countries, coming in instead at 25th of 27.
The report showed that in countries where the 48-hour maximum applied, it was in excess of average weekly working hours, generally appearing to operate essentially as a “safety net”. However, where the maximum was set at 40 hours per week, this proved to be far closer to usual weekly working hours in some cases. Consequently, the UK, though averaging more than the majority of countries in terms of actual hours worked, proved to be further from illegal levels of working hours than some other countries.
The report also demonstrated that UK unions have been among the most effective in negotiating ‘reasonable’ working hours, with only France and Denmark unions achieving a better record.
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