Question to the Department for Business and Trade:

To ask the Secretary of State for Business and Trade, what assessment his Department has made of the potential impact of the individual opt-out agreement under the Working Time Regulations 1998 on employee protections.

A review of the impact of the Working Time Regulations on the UK labour market was undertaken by the Coalition Government in 2014. It found a decline since 1998 in the incidence of long-hours working despite the existence of the opt-out, and a general trend towards shorter working hours.

It also found that the vast majority of long-hours workers would not have wanted to work fewer than 48 hours per week if it meant less pay, and that there appeared to be broad based support for the opt-out amongst UK business, long-hours workers, and the wider public.