Poor Britain is at the foot of yet another international league table, according to a new psychological survey: it’s the European office-fun league.

More than one in three of us bemoans the fact that we suppress the fun-loving side of our personalities at work, reports a pan-European study of 4,000 employees.

An “alarming'” number of workers leave their sense of fun at the door when they arrive at the office or factory, according to the business psychology consultants OPP. Well, is that really so alarming?

“Fun” is just another anodyne American buzz-concept infecting our shores. Everything should be fun: eating should be fun, learning should be fun, driving should be fun and now work should be fun.

Work should not be challenging, stimulating, enriching or downright bloody difficult – but fun. The consultants behind the study caution that people’s sense of creativity may be subdued if they feel that they are working in a “low-fun” environment.

Apparently we feel that we have about 10 per cent less fun in the workplace than our colleagues in the Netherlands and France. But fun is a subjective and culturally mediated concept. Our idea of fun may differ vastly from the French idea.

Well, it must be. Nicolas Sarkozy, their President, spends his fun time having it off with an Italian fashion model. Our Mr Brown gets his kicks thinking up new stealth taxes. Likewise, the ideal form of British corporate “fun” would be the sort of low-wattage rictus grin that keeps us dutifully turning up at work on time and staying late because it’s “enjoyable”.

Real, true fun – mischief, mayhem, subversion, recklessness – isn’t something that fits with the requirements of corporate culture. Jérôme Kerviel, the Frenchman who lost Société Générale £3.7 billion, was no doubt having fun when he started hitting the buy and sell buttons. I’m not convinced that it’s what Britain’s bosses want.

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