The efforts the Finnish Presidency, made to reach a political agreement on the revision of the working hours' directive during the November 7th EU's Ministers' Council, have not been rewarded. A blockade minority, composed of - notably - France, Spain, and Italy, has refused to accept a compromise that would not set a definite date for the abolition of the opt-out - the ability to derogate from the 48-hours maximum weekly limit. This failure makes way for a situation that cannot make anybody happy: the 23 countries likely not to apply the community right to working hours, who are also waiting for the revision of the directive to settle their disputes, are more than ever under the threat of an infringement procedure in front of the CJEC. (Ref. 061112)
The compromise was not enough for France, Spain, Italy, Greece and Cyprus. Five presidencies have worked really hard to come up with compromises. The last attempt by the Finnish Presidency however comprised a balance that could have been taken over by the Ministers’ Council (see our article n°061082): 1/ a new definition of the inactive on call time period, allowing not to consider it as working time; 2/ supervision of the appeal to the opt-out and limits to its use; 3/ countries resorting the
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