Belgian civil servants given legal right to disconnect from work

Law allows 65,000 federal workers to make themselves unavailable outside normal working hours

Belgian civil servants will no longer need to answer emails or phone calls out of hours after the country became the latest in Europe to offer workers the right to disconnect.

The law, which comes into effect on Tuesday, means 65,000 federal officials are able to make themselves unavailable at the end of the normal working day unless there are exceptional" reasons for not doing so.