Sir, - Long, long before any Maastricht Treaty was ever considered, it had been known that a working week of 60 hours (and even 48 hours) was detrimental to labour productivity. Health and safety factors also came into the equation many years ago.
It was unfortunate that last week RTE should choose someone in the service industry to criticise the forthcoming legislation. Even well organised service and maintenance functions experience peaks and valleys in workloads. It is to be hoped that the new Bill will contain some averaging clause for such situations.
Apart from any effect on productivity and health and safety, there is also the job absorption caused by overtime working. A survey carried out in the early 1980s by the Industrial Engineering Department of University College, Galway, showed, amongst other things, that if overtime working was to be restricted to 50 per cent of what it then was, the labour vacuum caused by this restriction would have resulted in a 10 per cent reduction in the dole queue. Since the survey was published, both main political parties (in coalition) have made noises as they placed the survey in the pending tray. - Yours, etc.,
Industrial/Mechanical
Engineering Dept.,
Regional Technical College,
Galway.