Belgium: government proposes flexible working time measures

On 12 October the ruling coalition of conservatives and liberals (MR-Open VLD), socialists and greens, as well as the Flemish Christian Democrats, reached an agreement for the 2022 budget. The partners referred negotiations for a four-day working week and night-time work in e-commerce to the social partners. However, they endorsed the introduction of a right for all to five days of professional training per annum.
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The coalition agreed on the possibility of spreading working time over four days instead of five. As such, while the daily working time is limited to 8 hours per day in Belgium, this compromise provides for the possibility of increasing this timespan to 9.5 hours. Thus, a four-day week could be introduced without any reduction in working time and could alternate with five-day working weeks. The details of how to implement the measure are being left to the social partners to negotiate. In...

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