MIC head explains EU overtime directive

Employees' right to work more than eight hours' overtime a week would remain if Malta joined the EU, Malta-EU Information Centre Head Simon Busuttil insisted, counteracting an accusation of deception and lying by Labour deputy leader Joe Brincat, which he strongly denied.

The EU directive on the organisation of working time clearly stated that employees could work more than eight hours a week overtime as long as they consented to, Dr Busuttil explained yesterday, circulating copies of Council Directive 93/104/EC.

Dr Busuttil was reacting to Dr Brincat's personal accusation and his "serious and grave" attack on MIC in the belief that the country deserved to know the truth and not be unduly worried about the overtime issue that had been raised.

Dr Brincat had obviously not understood the law, or had not read it all, or, for some reason, was altering the truth, Dr Busuttil said.

Apart from misunderstanding the situation, Dr Brincat was even defaming the MIC head when he had always gone to great lengths to clarify the situation on overtime.

Dr Busuttil once again explained the situation as regards overtime in the hope of clarifying to Dr Brincat, who filed a judicial protest against him and the permanent secretary in the Office of the Prime Minister, Joseph R. Grima, and to "put the public's mind at rest".

The information centre has been inundated by calls from misinformed, genuinely and unduly preoccupied workers since Dr Brincat said they would not be able to continue doing overtime once Malta joined the EU.

Dr Busuttil quoted the law, an extract from the draft accession treaty on social policy and environment and the EU Common Position, which stated, in black and white, that employees would have the right to do more than eight hours a week of overtime.

Quoting the law, Council Directive 93/104/EC, also known as the Working Time Directive, Dr Busuttil pointed out Article 18, which says that a member state has the option not to apply Article 6 that states that the average working time for each seven-day period, including overtime, does not exceed 48 hours.

Dr Brincat must have stopped at Article 6 of the law, Dr Busuttil said.

The rest of Article 18 goes on to state that the "necessary measures must be taken to ensure that no employer requires a worker to work more than 48 hours over a seven-day period... unless he has first obtained the worker's agreement to perform such work".

What the law highlights is that an employer cannot force employees to work more than eight hours overtime without their consent and that the conditions have to guarantee their health and safety, Dr Busuttil explained.

Furthermore, as a result of negotiations and following research into the matter, the application of the law was being delayed in the case of certain companies, particularly in manufacturing, who had feared that the fact that employees could refuse overtime would cause production problems.

These employees could be forced to do more overtime than they wanted - as was the current situation - until the end of 2004. Their right to refuse overtime was being postponed until then, giving these companies two years to organise themselves.

After the transitional period, the same right to overtime would apply to everyone, Dr Busuttil said.

If Malta joined the EU, workers would have the right to refuse overtime. That did not mean they could not do more than eight hours, Dr Busuttil continued.

At the moment, workers could be obliged to do overtime according to their employer's needs and risked being penalised, or fired if they refused. Now workers would be able to do as much overtime as they wanted as long as they consented.

Contrary to what Dr Brincat had understood, the law was shifting the right of the employer onto the employee, who would be the one to decide whether he wanted to do more overtime, over and above the weekly eight hours. That was the fundamental difference.

Quoting the EU Common Position, Dr Busuttil read out that the EU "takes note of the justification put forward by Malta, in particular that the transitional period is requested to provide for additional time for the sub-sectors to replace the status of overtime from a mandatory obligation, at the request of the employer, to a discretionary and voluntary decision by the employee, to enable the sub-sectors to sustain the continuity of operation to adapt to the requirements of the acquis... In the light of these considerations the EU can accept Malta's request".

Before coming up with his story, Dr Brincat had even visited MIC to speak to an official on the subject, Dr Busuttil said. However, he still managed to make unfounded accusations.

Nevertheless, Dr Busuttil was assuming that the reason why Dr Brincat had called him a liar and deceiving was because he had not understood parts of the law, or had not read it all and had come to the wrong conclusions.

It was assumed that he had made a genuine mistake and had no bad intentions.

Dr Busuttil said he would, therefore, be giving Dr Brincat the "benefit of the doubt".

Dr Brincat had not yet realised that he had made a mistake and, when he did, he would correct himself and withdraw his defamatory comments, Dr Busuttil assumed.

In the absence of a retraction of the accusations, which MIC called for, it reserved the right to take action to ensure that no one would feel they had the right to "haphazard mud-slinging".

Dr Busuttil said that had Dr Brincat followed the negotiations, he would have been able to clarify the situation in the beginning.

MIC's integrity should not be attacked since it was saying the truth, he insisted.