Spanish Parliament Rejects Bill to Shorten Working Week

The measure sought to cut the maximum work week to 37 1/2 hours, while critics warned of higher costs.

Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez speaks during a session at parliament in Madrid on Dec. 12, 2018. Reuters/Susana Vera

Spain’s lower house of parliament has rejected a bill that would have shortened the working week, delivering a setback to Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez’s Socialist Workers’ Party-led minority government as it struggles to push through promised reforms.

In a late vote on Sept. 10, opposition parties joined with Catalonia’s pro-independence Junts to block the bill from advancing to debate.

The measure, championed by Labor Minister Yolanda Díaz and backed by Spain’s main trade unions, would have reduced the maximum work week to 37 1/2 hours from 40 hours.

Lawmakers from the Popular Party, Vox, Junts, and the regional Navarrese People’s Union backed amendments blocking the bill, passing them with 178 votes in favor and 170 against.

The proposal was part of Sánchez’s coalition agreement with Díaz’s progressive Sumar platform.

Trade unions, which attended the session after leading protests outside the chamber, argued that the measure would modernize Spain’s labor market and improve living standards. Employers’ groups countered that it would increase costs and hurt competitiveness.

In a joint statement on Sept. 11, trade unions Unión General de Trabajadores and Comisiones Obreras condemned the outcome, saying parliament had blocked debate on a measure that enjoyed broad public backing. They noted that opinion polls showed that two-thirds of citizens supported shorter hours.

“More than 12 million working people have seen their legitimate aspirations temporarily thwarted,” they wrote.

Spain’s main business association, the Spanish Confederation of Business Organizations, welcomed the bill’s rejection, stating that it avoided “a serious negative impact on the economy, employment, and also on consumers.”

In a joint statement with the Spanish Confederation of Small and Medium-Sized Enterprises, the confederation said that the debate “must return to social dialogue and collective bargaining” and warned that unilateral cuts to working hours would generate “organizational problems, lower productivity, higher costs, lower quality of services, and a reduced attractiveness for investment.”

Working Hours Debate

The defeat feeds into a wider European debate on productivity and work-life balance.

Trials of four-day working weeks have been carried out in several European countries, including the UK.

Belgium introduced a law in 2022 allowing employees to request a four-day work week, although the total number of working hours remains unchanged. In France, the legal working time is set at 35 hours per week for full-time work.

Junts defended its decision, with party spokesperson Míriam Nogueras saying reductions in working time in most European countries are achieved through collective bargaining, not legislation.

“No country in the [European Union], except France and Belgium, has by law a reduction in working hours,” she said. “All of them do it through collective bargaining. You cannot legislate the same for everyone, when they are different realities.”

Madrid-based El País reported that the debate in Congress was unusually heated, with Díaz criticizing Junts for voting with the right and Junts rejecting that accusation.

Beyond shorter hours, the draft law also sought to strengthen rules on recording working time and enshrine the right of workers to disconnect from digital communications outside office hours. The ministry stated that tougher timekeeping via mandatory digital systems would curb widespread fraud in overtime reporting.

The defeat is yet another setback for Sánchez, who has led a minority coalition government since 2018 and currently seeks enough parliamentary support to pass a budget that is more than two years overdue.

The leader of the Socialist Workers’ Party has also sought to distance himself from a series of corruption scandals overshadowing his third term in office. In July, under mounting pressure, Sánchez unveiled a 15-point anti-corruption package that includes measures for stiffer criminal penalties, greater transparency in public procurement, and the use of artificial intelligence tools to help detect fraud.