Hi there. I wonder if anyone can clarify this for me please:

I am employed by a council in Scotland. My shifts either run early 07:00-14:30 or late 14:15-22:00. As I understand the Working Time Directive, a worker is entitled to an 11 hour daily rest period between shifts. So, I should not be forced to work a "late" until 10pm, then the next day work an "early" starting at 07:00.

I put this to my employer and they directed me to 2 parts of the WTD:

8.3 Where a worker is required to work beyond their scheduled finish time, and will not receive the full daily rest period, compensatory rest must be given immediately thereafter i.e. before the beginning of the next scheduled start time.

8.5 Where a shift worker cannot be rostered to receive the required 11 hours rest between the end of one shift and the start of the next compensatory rest must be given before the start of the next shift e.g. 10.30pm finish followed by a 07.30 am start. The 2 hours rest not received between these times must be given as compensatory rest before the start of the next shift, i.e. the subsequent rest period from the shift finish time must be for at least 13 hours before another shift can be rostered.

They also said "as the requirement is an 11hours break after a shift finishes the next shift after a 10pm finish should start at 9am, if they had to start earlier due to operational cover at 7am they extra 2 hrs they lost from the 13hours break would be added to the end of that shift finishing time, so the 11hours break would then have the 2hours extra worked to ensure that there was then a 13 hour break from finishing the 2nd shift before the start of the next shift"

An example of my rota for 3 weeks:

Monday 3 Oct: 07:00 to 14:15 (EARLY)

Tuesday 4 Oct: OFF

Wednesday 5 Oct: OFF

Thursday 6 Oct: 14:15 to 22:00 (LATE)

Friday 7 Oct: LATE

Saturday 8 Oct: EARLY

Sunday 9 Oct: EARLY

Monday 10 Oct: EARLY

Tuesday 11 Oct: LATE

Wednesday 12 Oct: EARLY

Thursday 13 Oct: EARLY

Friday 14 Oct: EARLY

Saturday 15 Oct: OFF

Sunday 16 Oct: OFF

Monday 17 Oct: OFF

Tuesday 18 Oct: OFF

Wednesday 19 Oct: LATE

Thursday 20 Oct: LATE

Friday 21 Oct: EARLY

Saturday 22 Oct: EARLY

Sunday 23 Oct: EARLY

I have highlighted the problematic shifts in red. Can someone please advise me if what my employer is saying makes sense in relation to my shifts, as I honestly do not understand the logic.

It takes me over 40 minutes to travel to work each way (this is a new work placement, I was working closer to home but have recently been moved).

Many thanks in advance!

it depends a bit what sort of work you do, see here

https://www.gov.uk/rest-breaks-work/compensatory-rest

also depends if you are too tired to work safely

Ah, yes. Well I work in care for people with disabilities so I guess that changes things.

Afraid so - although you could ask about changes so you were less tired, nothing stopping a request