An increasing body of evidence addressing hours of work indicates that we are fast approaching, or may have already passed, the point of diminishing returns in many industries. This is particularly relevant for those working significantly more than 50 hours per week.

In this paper it is argued that the extension of working hours, particularly for shift workers has significantly reduced the time available for sleep and social activities. For many Australian workers, their families and communities, extended working hours have led to increased levels of fatigue and decreasing levels of social support. This in turn has the potential to compromise safety and the long-term health and wellbeing of workers and the organisations that employ them.

A significant body of research has now demonstrated declining workplace performance has been associated with extended hours. In addition, extended hours of work have also been associated with reduced employee wellbeing, reduced organisational commitment and poor health outcomes. These factors have in turn been linked to declining levels of productivity and workplace safety.

It is our belief that many organisations have directly benefited from the productivity gains associated with extended hours of work, while passing the direct costs on to the community and taxpayer. In order to determine whether extended hours of work advantages Australia as a whole, or constitutes an indirect subsidy to industry, it is essential to recognise a broader conception of costs in our overall evaluation of working hours policy. Indeed where extended hours of work result in a net trnsfer of costs to the community and taxpayer, it can be argued that such practices constitute anti-competitive behaviour.

Given the diversity of Australian workplaces and the people within them, it is our belief that hours of work can be managed most appropriately at the enterprise or industry level. This has been a particular aim of the recent ACTU position on reasonable hours, which introduces a general standard of fairness with respect to the requirement to work entended hours. As such, the recommendations of he clause are appropriately aimed at industry as a whole. Although in our opinion, the subsequent clauses operationalising that principleare relatively conservative and may not consistently achieve the stated goals of the first clause.

We suggest it would be reasonable to embrace the general principle of reasonable hours but to require it to be operationalised at the enterprise and/or industry level. That is, to permit extended hours but within a framework that requires an individual organisation to present a coherent argument as to why working extended hours in a specific context does not disadvantage the community or compromise safety in the workplace.

The whole report – Extended working Hours In Australia: Counting The Costs – can be downloaded from the Queensland Department of Industrial Relations website.