Social Europe

politics, economy and employment & labour

  • Projects
    • Corporate Taxation in a Globalised Era
    • US Election 2020
    • The Transformation of Work
    • The Coronavirus Crisis and the Welfare State
    • Just Transition
    • Artificial intelligence, work and society
    • What is inequality?
    • Europe 2025
    • The Crisis Of Globalisation
  • Audiovisual
    • Audio Podcast
    • Video Podcasts
    • Social Europe Talk Videos
  • Publications
    • Books
    • Dossiers
    • Occasional Papers
    • Research Essays
    • Brexit Paper Series
  • Shop
  • Membership
  • Ads
  • Newsletter

Telework and the ‘right to disconnect’

by Oscar Vargas Llave and Tina Weber on 8th December 2020

TwitterFacebookLinkedIn

Pressure is growing within the European Parliament for an EU directive.

right to disconnect,telework
Oscar Vargas Llave

The Covid-19 pandemic has changed the way we live and work in unprecedented ways. According to the second Eurofound ‘Living, Working and Covid-19’ survey, in July 34 per cent of respondents were solely working from home.

Telework can offer greater flexibility and autonomy in work organisation, enhancing efficiency and productivity. It can contribute to a better balance between work, family life and leisure time and cut commuting.

right to disconnect,teleworking
Tina Weber

But telework can also blur the boundaries between work and private life, by making workers reachable by phone, e-mail or instant messages outside of normal working hours. This ‘always on’ culture may be aggravated by organisational cultures characterised by heavy workloads and overtime, resulting in long working hours. Moreover, remote working may bring monitoring systems which invade privacy and liberty.

Get our latest articles straight to your inbox!

"Social Europe publishes thought-provoking articles on the big political and economic issues of our time analysed from a European viewpoint. Indispensable reading!"

Polly Toynbee

Columnist for The Guardian

Thank you very much for your interest! Now please check your email to confirm your subscription.

There was an error submitting your subscription. Please try again.

Powered by ConvertKit

Working from home during the pandemic has led many to extend their working days late into the evening, and to the weekend. Eurofound research has shown that intensive teleworking, a work-life balance conflict, longer working hours and insufficient rest were quite common among employees working remotely and flexibly with information and communication technologies (ICT).

Workers in such arrangements are also more likely to report suffering from health-related problems, such as work-related stress and sleep disorders. So can ICT-enabled flexible work be better framed, to improve the protection of workers, while maintaining the benefits of flexibility for individuals and companies?

Legislation

This is the background to the debate around the ‘right to disconnect’. Yet to be formally conceptualised, it can be described as the right of workers to switch off their devices after work—without facing consequences for not replying to e-mails, calls or messages.

Only France, Belgium, Italy and Spain have legislated for a right to disconnect. They do not prescribe how it should be operationalised and rely on social dialogue, at sectoral and company level, to determine the modalities of implementation. And there are differences in the scope of legislation and the existence of a fall-back option (such as a charter elaborated by employers), should negotiations fail to reach an agreement. In the Netherlands and Portugal, legislative proposals have been made but the process is stalling.

In eight countries (Germany, Finland, Ireland, Luxembourg, Lithuania, Malta, Sweden and Slovenia), a more or less intensive debate is taking place on the right to disconnect, with discussions being most advanced in Germany, Malta and Ireland; in some the debate has re-emerged in the context of the pandemic.

In the remaining 13 member states of the European Union there is no debate on legislation. Existing legislation is perceived to be sufficient, ICT-based flexible work is not widespread—as in most east-European countries—or collective bargaining is preferred when it comes to improving work-life balance, as in Scandinavian countries.


We need your help! Please support our cause.


As you may know, Social Europe is an independent publisher. We aren't backed by a large publishing house, big advertising partners or a multi-million euro enterprise. For the longevity of Social Europe we depend on our loyal readers - we depend on you. Thank you very much for your support!

Become a Social Europe Member

Right to disconnect and national legislation in the 27 member states

Source: contributions by the Network of Eurofound Correspondents and European Commission

Hard and soft measures

The right to disconnect is being operationalised through a variety of hard and soft measures, determined primarily via company-level agreements. Hard disconnection tends to entail connectivity shutdowns after a pre-defined hour or the blocking of incoming messages—akin to a ‘right to be disconnected’. Softer measures include pop-up messages reminding workers (and/or clients) that there is no requirement to reply to emails out of hours. The latter are often accompanied by training on the importance of achieving a good work-life balance.

While different approaches provide the flexibility to tailor solutions to the company, the implications and impact also differ. A ‘right to be disconnected’ can be more effective and it places the onus on the employer, but it may limit flexibility for both employers and workers. A ‘softer’ approach, based on the ‘right to disconnect’, however requires employees to make a decision—which they may be reluctant to do if perceived as betraying lack of ambition, with potentially negative career implications.

While evaluations of the impact of right-to-disconnect legislation on work-life balance and health and safety are not to hand, there is evidence of a boost to collective bargaining, resulting in more agreements at sectoral and company levels. Notwithstanding the national differences, there is a relatively broad consensus among social partners that the modalities of connection and disconnection, as well as the organisation of working time in remote working, have to be determined and agreed, at least, through social dialogue at company (or/and sectoral) level, to ensure they are adapted to specific needs. It is however recognised that in member states with low unionisation and attenuated collective bargaining such an approach could entail an unequal playing-field.

EU directive

In a resolution adopted on December 1st, the Employment Committee of the European Parliament said member states had to ensure that workers were able to exercise the right to disconnect effectively, including by means of collective agreements. Adding that this was vital to protect workers’ health, the committee called on the European Commission to propose a directive enshrining the right. This non-legislative resolution is expected to be voted on in a plenary session in January 2021. Once endorsed by the parliament, it would be advanced to the commission and member states for implementation as part of future regulatory decisions.

Given that the pandemic has sparked a new debate in many countries about extending flexible working (including teleworking) to more workers, it is likely that discussions on the right to disconnect will also become more pressing as the ‘new normal’ of working life unfolds. Although some relevant legislation is in place at European and national level, data gathered by Eurofound show that the issues linked to constant connectivity persist.

Even in the absence of any evaluation, what is clear is that in countries with legislation on the issue, the number of collective agreements reached and actions taken at company level have increased. This demonstrates not only the important role of social partners but also that legislation can provide an impetus for the issue to be tackled, while still open to adaptation to specific requirements at company level.

This is part of a series on the Transformation of Work supported by the Friedrich Ebert Stiftung

TwitterFacebookLinkedIn
Home ・ Economy ・ Telework and the ‘right to disconnect’

Filed Under: Economy Tagged With: transformation of work

About Oscar Vargas Llave and Tina Weber

Oscar Vargas Llave is a research officer in the working life unit of Eurofound. Tina Weber is research manager at Eurofound.

Partner Ads

Most Popular Posts

sovereignty Brexit and the misunderstanding of sovereignty Peter Verovšek
globalisation of labour,deglobalisation The first global event in the history of humankind Branko Milanovic
centre-left, Democratic Party The Biden victory and the future of the centre-left EJ Dionne Jr
Covid 19 vaccine Designing vaccines for people, not profits Mariana Mazzucato, Henry Lishi Li and Els Torreele
EU recovery package,Next Generation EU Light in the tunnel or oncoming train? Adam Tooze

Other Social Europe Publications

US election 2020
Corporate taxation in a globalised era
The transformation of work
The coronavirus crisis and the welfare state
Whither Social Rights in (Post-)Brexit Europe?

Social Europe Publishing book

With a pandemic raging, for those countries most affected by Brexit the end of the transition could not come at a worse time. Yet, might the UK's withdrawal be a blessing in disguise? With its biggest veto player gone, might the European Pillar of Social Rights take centre stage? This book brings together leading experts in European politics and policy to examine social citizenship rights across the European continent in the wake of Brexit. Will member states see an enhanced social Europe or a race to the bottom?

'This book correctly emphasises the need to place the future of social rights in Europe front and centre in the post-Brexit debate, to move on from the economistic bias that has obscured our vision of a progressive social Europe.' Michael D Higgins, president of Ireland


MORE INFO

Hans Böckler Stiftung Advertisement

Renewing labour relations in the German meat industry: an end to 'organised irresponsibility'?

Over the course of 2020, repeated outbreaks of Covid-19 in a number of large German meat-processing plants led to renewed public concern about the longstanding labour abuses in this industry. New legislation providing for enhanced inspection on health and safety, together with a ban on contract work and limitations on the use of temporary agency employees, holds out the prospect of a profound change in employment practices and labour relations in the meat industry. Changes in the law are not sufficient, on their own, to ensure decent working conditions, however. There is also a need to re-establish the previously high level of collective-bargaining coverage in the industry, underpinned by an industry-wide collective agreement extended by law to cover the entire sector.


FREE DOWNLOAD

ETUI advertisement

ETUI/ETUC (online) conference Towards a new socio-ecological contract 3-5 February 2021

The need to effectively tackle global warming puts under pressure the existing industrial relations models in Europe. A viable world of labour requires a new sustainability paradigm: economic, social and environmental.

The required paradigm shift implies large-scale economic and societal change and serious deliberation. All workers need to be actively involved and nobody should be left behind. Massive societal coalitions will have to be built for a shared vision to emerge and for a just transition, with fairly distributed costs, to be supported. But this is also an opportunity to redefine our societal goals and how they relate to the current focus on (green) growth.

What targets or objectives should be set and how might they be reached? How can we create a sustainable European growth model? How can we reverse the trend towards growing inequalities? What kind of Green New Deal is a realistic and feasible prospect for Europe? What elements of justice, solidarity and equity constitute a fair and sustainable social foundation? What are the roles of the market, the state, industry and civil society? And what role can trade unions play to build a sustainable future that addresses all of these dimensions?


FOR PROGRAMME CLICK HERE

Confirmed speakers include: Ursula von der Leyen, Mariana Mazzucato, Nicolas Schmit, Dominique Meda, Tim Jackson, Juliet Schor, Frans Timmermans and many more.


TO REGISTER CLICK HERE

Eurofound advertisement

Industrial relations: developments 2015-2019

Eurofound has monitored and analysed developments in industrial relations systems at EU level and in EU member states for over 40 years. This new flagship report provides an overview of developments in industrial relations and social dialogue in the years immediately prior to the Covid-19 outbreak. Findings are placed in the context of the key developments in EU policy affecting employment, working conditions and social policy, and linked to the work done by social partners—as well as public authorities—at European and national levels.


CLICK FOR MORE INFO

Foundation for European Progressive Studies Advertisement

Read FEPS Covid Response Papers

In this moment, more than ever, policy-making requires support and ideas to design further responses that can meet the scale of the problem. FEPS contributes to this reflection with policy ideas, analysis of the different proposals and open reflections with the new FEPS Covid Response Papers series and the FEPS Covid Response Webinars. The latest FEPS Covid Response Paper by the Nobel laureate Joseph Stiglitz, 'Recovering from the pandemic: an appraisal of lessons learned', provides an overview of the failures and successes in dealing with Covid-19 and its economic aftermath. Among the authors: Lodewijk Asscher, László Andor, Estrella Durá, Daniela Gabor, Amandine Crespy, Alberto Botta, Francesco Corti, and many more.


CLICK HERE

About Social Europe

Our Mission

Article Submission

Legal Disclosure

Privacy Policy

Copyright

Social Europe ISSN 2628-7641

Find Social Europe Content

Search Social Europe

Project Archive

Politics Archive

Economy Archive

Society Archive

Ecology Archive

.EU Web Awards