The Centre for Economics and Business Research (CEBR) said each bank holiday costs the UK in the region of £2.3 billion. They say that we lose £19bn per year from these “breaks”. If we didn’t have these holidays the GDP (Gross Domestic Product) of the UK would be £19bn more!
‘We have done some maths on this and about 45 per cent of the economy suffers, the offices, the factories, the building sites where people tend not to go to work on Bank Holiday”
~CEBR founder Douglas McWilliams
If this is the case surely we should cut down on the amount of Bank Holidasy we ahve in the UK or just rid of them. But apparently not- we should instead spread them out as people ‘would enjoy them a lot more’.
Its not just one think tank which seems to think this.
The Governor of the Bank of England, Mervyn King, warned that GDP in the second quarter of this year might shrink owing to the number of bank holidays. Lets face it we do have quite a few this year.
“This year’s extra bank holiday for the Diamond Jubilee means there are five in April, May and June outside Scotland, where Easter Monday is not a holiday.”
~BBC News
However compared to our trading partners & other developed economies we don’t have many Bank Holidays.
- Japan, South Korea 15
- Spain, Malta 14
- Portugal, Austria 13
- Greece, South Africa 12
- France, Italy, Brazil, New Zealand 11
Source: Mercer HR, December 2011
So is it time David and his mates at Number 10 had a rethink on the whole issue?
