The BBC's Heather Bryan reports on the implications for doctors

The directive, which came into effect in the UK on 1 October 1998, says that no-one should work more than 48 hours in a week.

Junior doctors regularly work more than this and hospitals depend on their long hours to provide round-the-clock care.

So far the directive has acknowledged the difficulty of limiting hours for people in professions with unusual working conditions.

But the European Commission (EC) is expected on Wednesday to introduce a version of the directive restricting the working hours of such people.

Long hours

The proposal would make it illegal for junior doctors to work more than an average of 54 hours a week over a four-month period.

The UK Government is expected to have seven years to implement it.

The British Medical Association (BMA) said that the NHS would not have enough staff if the proposals were introduced too quickly.

It also warned that the government would fail to hit its targets on waiting lists and doctors' training could suffer.

At the moment junior doctors are not supposed to work more than 72 hours a week including their time spent on call, or 56 hours actually in contact with patients.

This was agreed in a package of measures called the New Deal. It was supposed to come into force in December 1996.

But the British Medical Association estimates that one in six hospital trusts have not yet fully implemented it.

A spokeswoman for the association said: "Even in those trusts where theoretically it has been implemented doctors often have to work longer than that.

"It is not uncommon for us to hear of doctors working 80, 90 or even 100 hours a week."

She said that while the BMA was "broadly in favour of bringing junior doctors within the working time directive", it would have to happen over time or else "the NHS would grind to a halt".

Waiting list targets

This would mean the government would not be able to meet its targets on cutting waiting lists, she said.

"If you were to reduce their working hours overnight there simply wouldn't be enough junior doctors in the system to see to the patients," she added.

Stephen Thornton, chief executive of the NHS Confederation, which represents NHS managers, said patient care could suffer.

He said that extending the working restrictions could cause "some very, very serious problems".

"Ultimately it comes down to a numbers game," he said. "We won't have enough doctors to go round and patient care will suffer."

Training difficulties

Mr Andrew Hobart is chairman of the BMA's Junior Doctors Committee.

Doctors in training need to be available

He welcomed the proposed inclusion of junior doctors, but said 6,000 new doctors would be needed to cope with the additional workload the EC proposals would create.

He also called for flexibility in implementation of the proposals.

Flexibility is important because doctors who are in training, and particularly surgeons, need to observe a wide range of procedures.

This means they could be called into hospital at short notice when a patient with a rare condition is admitted.

However, under the EC proposals, this would be illegal if a doctor had already worked 54 hours that week.

Mr Hobart warned that training could suffer because many doctors already worked more hours than they should.

He said: "The proposed application of the Working Time Directive to doctors in training would pose considerable difficulties in the delivery of health services and the provision of adequate training for the consultants of the future.