Photographer: Hollie Adams / Bloomberg
Photographer: Hollie Adams / Bloomberg
The UK government is exploring reforms to workers’ rights that would violate European Union rules, potentially opening up the UK up until retaliatory measures of the bloc.
The authorities drew up proposals that would remove the 48-hour limit for the length of the work week, according to a person familiar with the matter, who said the plans are preliminary and that ministers have yet to make decisions. The measures were first reported by the Financial Times.
Business Secretary Kwasi Kwarteng said on Twitter that the government “will not lower the standards of workers’ rights”.
If the plans are implemented, they have the potential to cause friction with the EU just a few weeks after the UK has sealed a deal. commercial agreement with the bloc. Negotiations dragged on until just before Christmas, the so-called fair playing field of fair competition rules being one of the last areas of contention.
O The agreement allows the UK and the EU to establish their own labor, environmental, climate and social policies, but also allows for retaliation if any change results in “material impacts on trade or investment between the parties”.
Changes to the regulation on breaks during working hours and a proposal not to include overtime in the calculation of some holiday allowances are also being considered, according to the person. The government intends to make changes that can support business and growth, without jeopardizing worker protection, they said.
‘Enhanced’ rights
“We have absolutely no intention of lowering the standards of workers’ rights,” the government said in a statement. “Leaving the EU allows us to continue to set standards and protect and enhance the rights of UK workers.”
Any proposals that emerge will be subject to a full consultation to ensure that no policy followed has any unwanted consequences that undermine workers’ rights, the person said.
Opposition Labor Party spokesman Ed Miliband accused ministers of “getting ready to tear up their promises to the British people and attack workers’ rights”, and said his party “will fight tooth and nail” to defend existing protections.
Ripping Up Rights
“These proposals are not aimed at reducing bureaucracy for companies, but at tearing vital rights for workers,” he said in a statement. “The government wants Britain to compete on the back of ordinary workers who lose their rights.”
Although the UK left the EU sharing the same environmental and labor rules, the ability to free the country from Brussels bureaucracy was hailed by Brexit supporters as one of its big prizes during the 2016 referendum campaign.
Prime Minister Boris Johnson, who was one of the personalities in that campaign, held a conference last week liaison with business chiefs during which he asked them to help him decide which regulations should be broken now that the bloc divorce was complete.