Over 100 agreements registered under Working Time Act

By the end of September 1998, a total of 109 collective agreements and notices had been registered with Ireland's Labour Court under the Working Time Act, which came into force on 1 March 1998, giving effect to the EU working time Directive. The agreements and notices allow variations from some of the Act's provisions.

Ireland's Working Time Act 1997, which came into force on 1 March 1998, seeks to implement the 1993 EU Directive on certain aspects of the organisation of working time (93/104/EC), which provides - among other rules - for a maximum 48-hour working week. Up until the end of September 1998, 109 collective agreements and notices providing for variations from the Act's provisions had been registered with the Labour Court under the Act. Collective agreements involve a formal employee representative body - either a trade union or a staff association. Companies without formal collective bargaining structures, such as non-union companies, are allowed to vary the Act through formal "notices", which are statements of consent to operate the transitional limits laid down in the legislation and which are also signed by the employees concerned. The Labour Court may reject applications for registering these notices if it takes the view that the employees did not properly give their consent to the arrangements.

Most of the agreements and notices registered with the Labour Court allow companies and unions to vary the provisions of the Act in two important ways:

• averaging out the 48-hour weekly working time limit over a 12-month period (the reference period varies depending on the workers' situation); and

• phasing in the 48-hour limit over two years, with limits of 60 hours in the first year and 55 hours in the second.

The chemicals sector accounts for almost a quarter of all registered agreements/notices recorded up to the end of September 1998, with construction next on 15%.

Under the legislation, collective agreements are necessary if companies want to vary the strict provisions laid down regarding rest breaks and night working. However, the number of agreements on these issues have been limited so far, partly because of sectoral exemptions which were introduced in a special "statutory instrument" which came into effect on the date the Act itself came into force (1 March 1998).

This instrument, (SI 21/98) exempts the following sectors from the Act's provisions on night working and rest breaks: tourism; agriculture; research and development; waste disposal; gas/water/electricity; ambulance, fire and civil protection; media and telecommunications; harbours/airports; hospitals and institutions; industrial activity which cannot be interrupted by "reason of considerations of a technical nature;" and activities "in which it is foreseeable that the rate at which production or the provision of services will vary significantly from time to time." Firms which avail of these sectoral provisions must provide equivalent periods of "compensatory rest".