As European elections loom, the Recruitment and Employment Confederation (REC) has called for drastic amendments to the European Agency Workers Directive.

The REC’s European manifesto claims the directive would “have a massively negative impact on temporary work in the UK and limit its potential benefits to the UK economy and labour market as a whole.”

The REC has called for the derogation period for equal treatment between temps and perms to be extended to 12 months from the proposed six weeks, and for the directive to be applied equally to public and private sector employers.

“One of the misconceptions behind the directive is that limiting temporary work would result in more permanent posts being available,” the manifesto states.

“Temporary workers are seldom a substitute for permanent workers. Surveys indicate that only 14% of companies would hire permanent staff to replace temporary workers.”