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		Letter to the Editor Nottingham Evening Post - Thursday 26th February 2004 Dear Sir, The Green Party welcomes the news that the UK opt-out from the Working Time Directive is under threat following a vote in the European Parliament (letters, 20th February). But those small businesses I met in the region last Friday will not welcome this news. Labour MEPs went against the advice of their own government and against British interests in voting to end the right of British workers to chose their own working arrangements. The abolition of our opt-out to the Working Time Directive will seriously damage labour market flexibility in the UK. Research has shown that the majority of British employers and employees are in favour of retaining the opt-out. A limit on the working hours would deny people the freedom to choose their working patterns and would prevent millions from earning overtime pay. My own step-son, a trucker, is very happy working a sixty-hour week and is spitting tin-tacks at this proposal. David Frost, Director-General of the British Chambers of Commerce, has said that Working Time Regulations have been the single biggest financial burden on business to come from Europe, costing £8.65 billion for business to implement since August 1999. Since Labour signed the Social Chapter in 1997, a raft of measures have been passed that make British and EU labour markets less flexible, add to burdens on business and threaten to destroy British jobs. Many more are in the pipeline. British business is not safe with Labour MEPs. Yours faithfully, Roger Helmer MEP