French mourn lost leisure time as Sarkozy ends 35-hour workweek

Michel Guyot often takes a weekday off to go to the Sugiton limestone cliffs on the Mediterranean Sea in southern France to smell the thyme and listen to the cicadas. Those cherished moments may soon be history, he says.

The engineer for a Total SA venture at a port near Marseille says it’s likely to be just a matter of months before his employer applies a law passed by France’s parliament this week that may reduce time off for white-collar workers, or cadres, by as many as 17 days a year.

“It’s a specter, a cloud over my head,” said Guyot, 60. “No more escapes to Sugiton to take a step back from work. This law will bring more stress, frustration and less productivity.”

Guyot, like other white-collar workers, is bracing for a dimming of their “joie de vivre” as President Nicolas Sarkozy pushes to keep a promise to “restore the value of work”. With the late night passage of the law on July 23, Sarkozy has rung the death knell of France’s 35-hour workweek, undoing labour rules put in place a decade ago by the Socialist Party.

Under that system, blue-collar workers were limited to 35 hours a week on the job. Cadres received days off to compensate for working more than 35 hours a week, giving them total annual paid leave of about seven weeks, including vacation.

French employees’ hours are the second-lowest in the Group of Seven industrialised countries, behind Germany, according to the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development. The French worked an average 1,561 hours in 2007, 291 fewer than in 1979. American workers put in 1,794 hours, down 31 hours.

Boosting Growth: The new law, which lets companies negotiate working hours, overtime and compensatory time directly with employees, is part of Sarkozy’s effort to counter a slump in economic growth and may come into effect in early September.

Since taking office last year, Sarkozy has blamed the 35-hour workweek for weakening French competitiveness. He fired his first salvo last year, allowing blue-collar employees to work more than the cap, in exchange for 25 per cent more pay for additional hours. Companies were exempt from labour taxes for these hours.