Flexible working arrangements are becoming increasingly popular with workers in the United Kingdom, with economic, technological, and social trends encouraging this development to continue. The
in the UK, for example, increased from six million in May 1992 to a peak of 8.7 million by June 2019. This increase equated to a 45 percent growth in part-time workers compared with an increase of just 22.8 percent in
during the same period. From March 2020 onwards, however, the number of part-time workers in the UK has fallen significantly, while the number of full-time workers continued to grow. As of June 2024, there were estimated to be 8.29 million part-time workers in the UK labor market.
Flexible working hours
As flexibility in where people work has grown, so too has flexibility in when people work. In 2024, over 4.23 million people in the UK were able to take advantage of
flexi-time, an arrangement that enables workers to, within certain parameters, choose their start and finish times. A less common arrangement is the
compressed working week, whereby employees work for 4.5 days a week, or for 9 days a fortnight, in place of the traditional 5 day week. Other types of flexible working contracts such as
annualized hours or
term-time working have also increased in recent years. In general those who have been able to partake in flexible working have seen it as a good thing, with a survey indicating that 83 percent of employees thought that it
helped them with their work-life balance. There is also broad support for further flexibility, with 63 percent of British people supporting the introduction of a
four-day working week, while the traditional 9 to 5 working day is one of the least popular
working times for British adults.
Zero-hours contracts
One of the most controversial types of working contract in the UK is the
zero-hours contract, a type of employment contract that doesn't guarantee the worker a minimum number of working hours from their employers. In the last few decades, the number of workers on this type of contract has increased substantially, from just 225,000 in 2000 to a peak of 1.22 million in 2023, with this number falling to 1.03 million in 2024.
Younger workers were far more likely to be on this type of contract than older ones, with around 411,000 16 to 24 year-old's on zero hours contracts in 2024, compared with just 147,000 25 to 34 year-old's. Zero-hours contracts were also more likely to be used in certain
industries than others, with 32.2 percent of accommodation and food sectors workers on this type of contract, compared with just four percent in construction.
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