It has been announced that there will be a special bank holiday in 2012 to celebrate the Queen’s Diamond Jubilee. The 2012 late May bank holiday will be moved to Monday 4 June 2012 and an additional Jubilee bank holiday will be on Tuesday 5 June 2012.

Bank and public holidays in England and Wales

There are different bank and public holidays in different parts of the UK. There are currently six permanent bank holidays in England and Wales and an additional one in 2012. Christmas Day and Good Friday are public holidays.

The expected bank and public holidays for England and Wales are listed in the table above.

Substitute days

When the usual date of a bank or public holiday falls on a Saturday or Sunday, a ‘substitute day’ is given, normally the following Monday. For example in 2011, Christams Day was on Sunday, 25 December, so there was a substitute bank holiday on Tuesday, 27 December.

Time off for employees

Employees  do not have an automatic right to paid leave on bank and public holidays, though many people receive the day off work. Any right to time off or extra pay for working on a bank holiday depends on the terms of the employee’s contract of employment.