British workers have shortest holidays in Europe

The UK will still be at the bottom of the European Union league for annual leave even after workers are given new rights to paid leave, according to Cambridgeshireís leading people solutions business, The One Group.

Minimum entitlement in this country is set to increase from the current 24 days to 28 by April 2009 under EU rules to stop UK firms counting the public holidays in employeesí annual leave.

Despite this increase, the UK will still lag behind its European counterparts, with Germany topping the league at 39 days a year, including public holidays, followed by Austria, 38, Sweden 36, Slovakia, Luxembourg and France with 35, Portugal, 34, the Czech Republic and Slovenia with 33, Italy, Spain and Greece with 32 and Poland and Finland with 31.

Tristan Drane, Director at The One Group, comments, ìThe new regulations are clearly aimed at preventing the practice of including the current eight bank holidays in the minimum entitlement – whereby some employees are effectively just getting 16 days leave.

ìHowever, even under these new regulations, which means employees will get more paid leave; UK workers will still be joint bottom of the EU league table for holidays with the Netherlands.î

According to the government, six million workers will benefit from the rise in annual leave and despite being bottom of the EU holiday league, the UK is still well ahead of many other developed nations.

In Canada and Japan, workers are guaranteed only 10 days of paid leave per year while the USA does not have any legal minimum for paid leave.

The One Group is a people solutions business, which provides specialist recruitment services and helps organisations drive business performance through their people. Employing 23 staff across its two centres in Cambridgeshire, the company has expanded its service portfolio and now has three dedicated recruitment divisions – accountancy, office appointments and executive.

One Engage and Retain, its performance improvement division, helps clients lift sales, customer service, team work, employee engagement and motivation as well as providing leadership and management development.