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JOHN MCDONNELL was last night accused of aping basketcase Venezuela after vowing to give workers a four-day week – without any reduction in pay.
In a desperate vote grab, Labour’s Shadow Chancellor yesterday promised full-time Brits would never work more than 32 hours a week within the decade.
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A new quango would effectively set the holiday allowance for 30 million employees each year – and let bosses and unions thrash out rotas. Wages would not be hit.
Mr McDonnell said: “We should work to live, not live to work.”
Alarmed critics accused the self-styled Marxist of “going Caracas” by threatening to turn Britain into a Zimbabwe or Venezuela as business chiefs warned the move would spark mass job losses.
It came as Mr McDonnell topped off a £90billion spending splurge by vowing to axe Universal Credit.
And he backed eye-watering proposals for a new ‘Universal Basic Service’ which would guarantee Brits free entry to swimming pools, public parks and could see them given a basic mobile phone.
‘WORKERS ON THE DOLE’
Labour’s pledge on the working week would see Brits go from working among the longest hours in Europe to the shortest – without any reduction in salaries.
Party chiefs pointed to agreements between Royal Mail and union leaders that have paved the way for greater automation.
But CBI chief Carolyn Fairbairn said: “The Labour Party should think long and hard about their name.
“They’ve gone from fighting for workers’ right to pushing policies that will put people out of work.”
She stormed: “McDonnell might have his sights set on a four day working week, but he’ll end up putting companies out of business and workers on the dole with his plans.”
‘GONE CARACAS’
Matt Kilcoyne, deputy director at the Adam Smith Institute, said: “We now know the Labour Party plans to outspend the Tories in every possible way, and pay for it using everyone else’s money.
“The result in the UK will be just the same as it was in Venezuela and Zimbabwe — spending beyond your means will mean businesses fleeing the country, your pensions raided and worthless, an end to the British jobs boom, inflation up and investment crashing.
“John McDonnell has gone caracas.”
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Labour’s startling policy push came just days after a report warned the party against setting a mandatory cap to reduce working hours. Lord Skidelsky’s said that when the French introduced legislation to cut the working week bosses responded by freezing wages and recruiting less.
And it plunged hospitals in to crisis, causing staff shortage and intensifying work to an “unpleasant degree”.
But Lord Skidelsly report called for the government to set a target to achieve a 35 hour working week in the public sector over the next target. And it also called for every Brit to be guaranteed a job or training.
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