Mr. Joe O'Connor:

Four Day Week Ireland thanks the committee for the opportunity to present. We are a campaign coalition formed in 2019, comprising trade unions, businesses and business leaders, environmentalists, women’s representatives and academics. We are part of the 4 Day Week Global foundation, a not-for-profit organisation established by international four-day week pioneer Andrew Barnes, following the successful introduction of a four-day working week in his business, Perpetual Guardian, in New Zealand in 2018. Since our launch in September 2019, we have been making the case for a gradual, steady and managed transition to a shorter working week in all sectors of the economy. We have started a public conversation in Ireland on the case for reduced working hours. Our medium-term objective is for the four-day working week to become the new default work arrangement across the economy, with no loss of pay.

We believe that this is not only achievable but essential as a response to technological change to allow us to future proof our economy and to share the benefits with workers. A growing body of international evidence, business case studies and academic research shows that a four-day week can be good for business, as well as for workers, families and the environment. Many companies that have trialled or introduced the four-day week report happier, more focused employees and, critically, higher productivity. They have experienced reduced employee burnout, stress, sick leave, absenteeism and turnover. For many businesses concerned with retaining their best employees as well as attracting and recruiting new talent, a shorter working week can provide a competitive edge.

Working less is shown to improve the physical and mental health and well-being of workers. It would also enable people to spend more time with their families, learn new skills, have more time for rest, leisure and socialisation and to give back to their local communities. It could also be revolutionary regarding gender equality, allowing better distribution of caring responsibilities between mothers and fathers. While on a societal level women still do the majority of care work, reduced working time will enable men to spend more time with their families and to take on more caring responsibilities in the home, which in turn will help remove barriers to women achieving senior positions in work, taking on leadership roles and pursuing training opportunities. Alongside a better work-life balance, a four-day week would also lead to reduced childcare costs for women and families.

Studies also show that a four-day week can significantly reduce carbon emissions and make a huge contribution to our defining collective struggle against climate change. Research from Chalmers University of Technology in Sweden identifies a close correlation between working time and carbon emissions, and projects that reducing the average working week to four days, or equivalent hours, would deliver a reduction in emissions of 16%.

Our campaign seeks to challenge the "always on" culture that has crept into aspects of the Irish economy, which lionises long hours as a perverse badge of honour, and to shift public, political and media narratives about working time reduction. A shorter working week is not about lazy workers wanting more time off, as some might have one believe. It is a business improvement strategy centred on working smarter rather than longer and on investing in the well-being of the most important asset to businesses – their people. In a poll carried out by Behaviour & Attitudes for Four Day Week Ireland in 2020, an enthusiastic response to the prospect of a four-day week was recorded among the Irish public. This concept was defined as "the same job, the same goals, the same salary but over four days rather than five". Just over three quarters, 77%, of those surveyed said they are supportive of the Government exploring the potential introduction of a four-day week. Among employers that responded, more than two out of three, or 67%, supported the Government doing this. Encouragingly, almost half of Irish employers, 46%, polled also said that they see trialling a four-day week in their workplace setting as being "feasible".

The four-day working week that we advocate for is a flexible model and not a rigid one-size-fits-all approach. It is based on the general principle of the 100-80-100 model - 100% of the pay, 80% of the time, but, crucially, in exchange for 100% of the productivity. The disruption to societal and workplace norms by the Covid-19 pandemic has illustrated the potential for different models of work for workers and employers and reinforced the need to rethink old established work patterns.

The Four Day Week Ireland campaign believes that the future of work requires a shift away from a focus on time spent in the office, at the desk or on the clock. This is not an effective way to measure people’s contributions at work or a rational metric with which to link income. We must focus instead on measuring and rewarding collective outputs, results and productivity. In fact, for many of the businesses that have made the four-day working week a success, the core reason they have almost counter-intuitively managed to deliver better business outcomes over four days rather than five is that they have not introduced the four-day week in isolation. They have trialled the four-day working week as an entry point to a process within their business which focuses on productivity, prioritisation and a more efficient way of working. They have had an open conversation with their people about how their business can work smarter rather than longer. They have been clear about the metrics by which the trial will be measured and what success will look like for their business, and upfront that this needs to work for the employee and the employer. Instead of taking a top-down approach to how this can be delivered, they have empowered their staff to come up with the ideas, solutions and changes to work practices that can ensure that they can maintain or even improve their output over four days rather than five. It has worked.

The case we are making for a shorter working week is not that we should adopt a nine-to-five, four-day working week across every economic sector and setting. Just as the nine-to-five, five-day week might be the standard or most common work arrangement today, it is, of course, not the only arrangement. There will continue to be a need for different types of flexibility for both workers and employers in order to ensure that working time reduction across society can coexist with ensuring that essential services in both the public and private sectors can continue to operate over five, six and, in some cases, even seven days. This will require strong management, clever rostering and buy-in from staff. We do believe, however, that some version of a shorter working week, based on the principle of the "100-80-100" model, is achievable right across the economy.

This is not just some abstract idea. The four-day week is working for huge numbers of businesses worldwide. This includes a long-running landmark trial of a shorter working week in Iceland, which was hailed as an "overwhelming success", with the vast majority of the country's workers securing contracts to shorten their hours. These trials ran between 2015 and 2019, cutting working weeks to between 35 and 36 hours from a 40-hour week for many, with no reduction in pay. This included offices, playschools, social service providers and hospitals. The landmark four-day week trial at Perpetual Guardian in New Zealand in 2018, monitored by academics at the University of Auckland, found engagement levels rose by between 30% and 40%, work-life balance metrics by 44% and so on. Microsoft Japan's 2019 four-day week trial yielded a 39% increase in productivity. In the US, leading fintech start-up Bolt and crowdfunding platform Kickstarter, among many others, have recently announced their intention to introduce a four-day working week. Closer to home, here in Ireland, the four-day week has been successfully adopted by a diverse range of companies in a number of different sectors across the island. This includes software developers in Donegal, a sales company in Clare and Armagh, a digital agency in Dublin, a legal practice in Newry, a public relations agency in Down and a recruitment, training and consultancy business located in Galway and Limerick, which the committee will hear from later this morning.

This should come as no surprise. Numerous academic studies, including from Stanford University's John Pencavel in 2014, show there is no correlation between working long hours and greater productivity. In fact, according to OECD figures, some of Europe's most productive economies, such as Denmark and the Netherlands, have among the shortest average working hours. Meanwhile, countries with longer average working hours, such as the UK and Greece, score among the poorest when it comes to productivity.

In June of this year the Four Day Week Ireland campaign launched the first ever four-day week pilot programme in Ireland, which will enable Irish employers to participate in a co-ordinated six-month trial of the four-day working week alongside similar pilot schemes in other countries, including the US, Canada and New Zealand. This follows the announcement of national, government-supported trials in other countries, including Spain and Scotland. As part of this, we have developed a package of tangible supports for employers that agree to participate in the pilot, which will provide those organisations with unparalleled access to the expertise, tools and resources they will need to run a smooth and successful trial. I hope to get the opportunity to address some of those supports as part of the discussion.

The roll-out of the six-month trial will take place in early 2022. Since the launch of the pilot programme, we have had an exceptional response from Irish employers, with over 100 private and voluntary sector companies expressing an interest in participating in the trial. Around half of those companies recently attended half-day information events held by Four Day Week Ireland on the practicalities of the pilot programme. We have since secured firm commitments from 17 companies to participate in the pilot, with many others still engaged in advanced internal deliberations and processes about joining.