§ Baroness Byfordasked Her Majesty's Government:
Whether the proposed European Union regulation to remove an individual's right to opt out of the Working Time Directive envisages the exclusion of certain groups of people or types of employment, such as agriculture or horticulture; whether, under the proposed regulations, the period over which the hours worked would be calculated would be extended; and, if so, to what. [HL5458]
§ Lord Sainsbury of TurvilleThere are at present no European Union proposals to remove the working time opt-out. The European Commission intends to issue an initial communication on the working time opt-out, the definition of working time with regard to on-call time and the working time reference period, around the end of November. We are not expecting the communication to contain any legislative proposals. There will then follow a consultation period before the Commission produces formal proposals, but it is too early to say what these will be.