An overview of public holidays in the
United Kingdom (once-Great Britain & Northern Ireland) in 2013, shown in separate tables for the whole of the UK, England & Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland.
Public holidays in the UK are generally referred to as
bank holidays due to the 4 days so designated by the Bank Holidays Act of 1871. The name is now used as a blanket term for all public holidays in the UK as banks, government offices and most businesses are closed on these days, although an increasing number of smaller shops and larger retail businesses remain open.
Public holidays in Britain comprise bank holidays declared by statute (as listed in the Banking and Financial Dealings Act 1971, Schedule 1), by royal proclamation, and common law/customary holidays (Good Friday and Christmas Day, which are not offical bank holidays in England, Wales and Northern Ireland). Royal proclamation is also used to move holidays that would otherwise fall on a weekend or that are moved for special occasions, or to create additional one-off holidays (such as for the Diamond Jubilee celebrations in 2012).
When a bank holiday falls on a Sunday the following Monday usually becomes the day when the holiday is observed (known as substitute day or 'bank holiday in lieu'). If the Monday is also a bank holiday, the substitute day moves to the following weekday. UK public holidays always move forward in the calendar, never backwards.
The August bank holiday always falls on the
last Monday of August in England, Wales and Northern Ireland, and on the
first Monday of August in Scotland. Its official name is "Summer Bank Holiday", however it is far more commonly referred to as the "August Bank Holiday". This website therefore uses this more frequently-heard term.
To read more about British public holidays please see the detailed information on
Public holidays in the United Kingdom on Wikipedia, and also
gov.uk.
Bank holidays and their dates vary between England & Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland. We are therefore showing them in 4 different tables so you can more easily get the information applicable to your region:
These four tables are also availabe below as templates to download and print.
The templates are saved in
Microsoft Word ".docx" format and can be used with the newer versions of Word that support the XML document standard (Word 2007, 2010, 2013, 2016, 2019, 2021 and Office 365). If you have one of the older
versions of Word that only supports the ".doc" format (Word 2000, 2002/XP & 2003), or if you don't have Word installed, use
Microsoft Office Online or one of the Microsoft Word/Microsoft Office alternatives
FreeOffice TextMaker,
LibreOffice Writer,
Google Docs and
others, which are all free of charge (
OpenOffice Writer unfortunately has formatting problems when opening our calendars), or use a
docx to doc converter (available for online or offline use). Also compatible with
Microsoft Office for Mac (macOS) and Microsoft Office mobile for iPad/iOS, Android and Windows 10 mobile.
The templates may be used free of charge for non-commercial use (for commercial use please
contact us). Not for commercial distribution or resale. All content of this website is copyright © 2011-2023 Calendarpedia®. All rights reserved. Data provided 'as is' without warranty and subject to error and change without notice.
See also: