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In a blow to entrepreneurship, the European Parliament has thrown out European Commission plans to exempt self-employed drivers from the 2002 Working Time Directive. Self-employed drivers were temporarily excused from the rules of the existing EU directive on working hours but were due to be governed by 23rd March 2009, unless the European Commission proposed legislation to the contrary. Despite hopes for an extended exemption for self-employed drivers, the revised directive was narrowly rejected by the parliament, meaning that the original directive will not be amended to cater for self-employed drivers. Critics have accused the decision of limiting “small entrepreneurs’ freedom” and setting an “unacceptable precedent”. “The outcome of this vote at the European Parliament is unacceptable. Despite our repeated warnings, MEPs rejected a reasonable proposal by the European Commission and went ahead with a stubborn, short-sighted attempt to apply one-size-fits-all rules to a very diverse set of drivers,” argued SME trade association UEAPME Secretary General, Andrea Benassi. Originally enforced in 2002 for all employees, the Working Time Directive is a collection of regulations concerning hours of work, designed to protect the health and safety of workers, limit the maximum length of a working week to 48 hours over seven days, minimise the number of paid leave days per annum as well as detailing rest periods between shifts. While no time frame has been agreed for the impact on self-employed drivers, it will be up to the European Commission to ensure that member states comply with the unaltered directive.
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