No 612
Tel: 96 673 0057
Monday 4th April 2016
Tel: 676 820 588
Issue 323
SPANISH PM SAYS IT'S TIME TO SCRAP THE SIESTA The Prime Minister of Spain Mariano Rajoy has announced his intention to revolutionize the way Spanish businesses work by changing the working hours to fall in line with other European countries.
As many parents of children also work split shifts the knock on effects of this antiquated practice trickle down to children who end up eating later and staying up later and are therefore tired the next day and perform poorly in school.
force would be more productive and businesses could be more competitive and work better with other European countries. Spain should not shut down from 2 pm to 4.30 pm every day, this is no longer conducive to economic growth.”
In addition to the change in working hours, which would effectively say goodbye to the “siesta”, the Spanish PM will push forward a new policy to change the Spanish Time Zone to Greenwich meantime to coincide with the UK and Portugal.
If more people finished work at 6pm, the Spanish work
Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy also wants to increase paternity leave time by 10 days for disabled fathers or fathers of disabled children and also fathers of larger families (3 or more children).
Prime Minister Rajoy added “ The Spanish siesta was introduced when the majority of people worked in the agricultural industry and it was simply too hot to work during the heat of the day but times have changed since then and many people who work split shifts do not use this time for naps but instead find themselves doing other things which ultimately leads to a less productive work force.
The Vice Secretary for the PP party, Javier Maroto, explained that these changes would be implemented in the next term should the PP party manage to form a government. Changing the working hours would require pacts between all the political parties and social groups and would not apply to those working in the public service sector or to companies whose businesses require around the clock shift work.