The European Union (EU) introduced a working time directive in 1993 (Council Directive 93/104/EC) that was implemented in the United Kingdom Law by the Working Time Regulations 1998. The regulations apply to midwives and give them general rights that include;
Working time
The latest working time directive (Directive 2003/88/EC 2003) defines working time as any period during which the midwife is working at the employer's disposal and carrying out their activity or duties, in accordance with national laws and/or practice. Any period which is not working time is regarded as a rest period. This means that work includes:
Travel between home and work at the beginning and end of the working day
While time spent travelling between the homes of the women and babies in their care has always been considered part of a community midwife's working day, the time spent travelling from home to the first call of the day and back home from the last call were considered rest periods and were not part of the working day.
The status of time spent between home and work was recently challenged in the European Court of Justice, the court that settles disputes over the implementation of European Union law. In Federación de Servicios Privados del sindicato Comisiones obreras (CC.OO.) v Tyco Integrated Security SL, Tyco Integrated Fire & Security Corporation Servicios SA [2015], the case concerned technicians employed to install security systems in people's homes and commercial premises. When the company's regional offices were closed, the technicians had no fixed place of work and so drove from home to their first client, and home again from the last client of the day. The company treated this first and last journey as rest periods outside the day's working hours.
The Court of Justice of the European Union held that workers travelling each day between their homes and the premises of their first and last clients, as designated by their employer, constitutes working time within the meaning of the directive. Employees who fall into this category are called mobile workers as they habitually travel to different places of work as opposed to having a permanent office. This would include many community midwives.
The Court held that workers, such as community midwives in this situation, were carrying out their duties over the whole duration of those journeys. For community midwives, the journeys to call on mothers and babies in their homes is done on the instruction of their employers and is essential to providing midwifery care. Not taking those journeys into account would enable the NHS to claim that only the time spent carrying out care would be working time and that would jeopardise the safety and health of midwives.
The Court held further that journeys at the beginning and at the end of the day to or from home visits are generally regarded as working time even if the journey begins from a central office.
The European Court of Justice took the view that midwives are at their employer's disposal for the time of those journeys as they act on the instructions of the employer, who may change the order of visits, cancel visits, or add an appointment. During the necessary travelling time, midwives cannot use their time freely or pursue their own interests as they are working during those journeys. So, midwives who do not have a fixed place of work are carrying out their duties during the journey to or from a home visit and must be regarded as working during that journey. As travelling is an integral part of being a community midwife, the place of work cannot be reduced to the homes of the mothers and babies in their care. Anything to the contrary would go against the objective of protecting the safety and health of workers pursued by the directive, which includes the necessity of guaranteeing workers a minimum rest period (Federación de Servicios Privados del sindicato Comisiones obreras (CC. OO.) v Tyco Integrated Security SL, Tyco Integrated Fire & Security Corporation Servicios SA [2015]). The decision applies automatically in the United Kingdom as the Working Time Regulations 1998 do not exclude this type of travelling time from the United Kingdom definition of working time. There is therefore no need for any change in the law to apply the decision of the Court of Justice of the EU.
Conclusion
The working time directive, put into domestic law by the Working Time Regulations 1998, seeks to protect the health and safety of workers, including midwives, by requiring limits to the working week that ensure staff have proper rest periods between shifts (Directive 2003/88/EC 2003). Working time now includes time spent travelling to and from their first and last calls, even where those journeys begin and end at the midwife's home. Midwives, who do not have a permanent office from which their journeys begin and end, can now include that first and last trip from and to their home as part of their working day.