The Court of Appeal has ruled there is no reason in principle why the required rest break after six hours under the Working Time Regulations has to be for an uninterrupted 20 minutes. It also stated that in appropriate circumstances, it might be better to have shorter, more frequent breaks throughout a shift.
The judgment came in the case of Network Rail v Crawford.
Mr Crawford worked as a signal box worker. When he was working alone, he was not able to take a single 20-minute uninterrupted break due to the nature of his work and he complained this breached the WTRs.
His employers said that he could take compensatory rest in 5/10/15 minute chunks during quiet periods and that these provided more than 20 minutes' rest over the course of his shift and were more beneficial to his health and safety.
The ruling means that in "special cases" such as this, employers can comply with the WTRs provided they allow workers to take frequent short breaks which in aggregate amount to 20 minutes or more.
However, employers whose staff are not treated as special cases must continue to allow them to take uninterrupted breaks.
