Stay ahead of the curve with our exclusive Q&A series, brought to you by leading law firm, Arthur Cox, LLP, designed to answer your most pressing legal questions. These expert insights provide clear guidance to ensure your HR practices remain compliant and protect your organisation.  

Public holidays and statutory leave—what happens when a holiday falls on a non-working day? 

The answer is not as straightforward as it may first appear. In accordance with the Working Time Regulations (Northern Ireland) 2016 (“the Regulations”), full time employees in Northern Ireland are entitled to a minimum of 28 days of paid leave every year. 

The question of whether a day on which the employee is not usually required to work can be designated as statutory annual leave has been the subject of case law, but the position remains a little unclear. Arguably, the Transocean case provides precedent for employers to require workers to take annual leave on days on which they would never be required to work. However, there have been no reported cases that support this development beyond the specific circumstances of the Transocean case. As such, there would be risk involved in designating a non-working day as statutory annual leave.

The other issue to consider is pay. The right is to paid time off. If a day which is not normally a working day is designated as statutory annual leave, then the employee should be paid accordingly for it. In other words, it may well be a breach of the Regulations (and an unlawful deduction from wages) to designate a non-working day as annual leave but only pay the employee for their normal working week (which they presumably worked in full).