Jeremy Corbyn vows to end Britain's long hours culture and give workers more time off
3 min read
Jeremy Corbyn will unveil plans to end Britain's long hours culture and boost the amount of time people get off work.
The Labour leader will say the advance of technology "can be the gateway for a new settlement between work and leisure".
Mr Corbyn will also pledge that Labour would boost skills and training by making all further education courses free, at a cost of £2.5bn a year.
In his keynote speech ending the Labour conference in Brighton, he will say: "We need urgently to face the challenge of automation; robotics that could make so much of contemporary work redundant.
"That is a threat in the hands of the greedy but what an opportunity if it’s managed in the interests of society as a whole.
"If planned and managed properly, accelerated technological change can be the gateway for a new settlement between work and leisure, a springboard for expanded creativity and culture, making technology our servant and not our master at long last."
A spokesman for Mr Corbyn said increased use of new technology in the workplace will inevitably boost productivity, and a Labour government would force them to pass on the benefits of that to employees through higher wages and shorter hours.
"When you've got big leaps forward in technological change and therefore productivity, that can be shared in various ways, both in profits and wages and salaries on the one hand, and increases in wages and salaries and increased leisure time ie shorter working hours," he said. "How that pans out is something that is up to political decisions and corporate decisions.
"What we're talking about is the potential for this big technological leap and the increase in productivity to be shared in different ways. If it's under the control only of large corporations, as it is currently, the sharing out is in one direction in long hours, the fall in real wages and increased profits.
"Who is in control of that process? If that process of big employment transformation is going to be managed for the benefit of the workforce, that needs to be planned at a national level, it can't just be left to the companies employing those people or introducing advanced robotics."
GRENFELL
Elsewhere in his speech, Mr Corbyn will also blame the "degraded" economic system pursued by Margaret Thatcher and New Labour for the circumstances that led to the Grenfell Tower fire.
Shadow Chancellor John McDonnell has previously said those responsible for the tragedy are guilty of "social murder".
The Labour leader will say: "The disregard for rampant inequality, the hollowing out of our public services, the disdain for the powerless and the poor have made our society more brutal and less caring.
"Now that degraded regime has a tragic monument - the chilling wreckage of Grenfell Tower, a horrifying fire in which dozens perished, an entirely avoidable human disaster.
"Grenfell is not just the result of bad political decisions. It stands for a failed and broken system, which Labour must and will replace."
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