Momentum to push Labour for four-day working week

MOMENTUM, the pro-jeremy Corbyn campaign group, will try to force the Labour Party to adopt a four-day working week as official policy ahead of the next general election.

It will use its 40,000-strong activist base to campaign in the run-up to Labour’s annual party conference in September to push through “radical and transformational” pledges.

Those pledges will include a much tougher position on combating climate change by requiring the UK to become carbon neutral by 2030 instead of the party’s current position of achieving net zero emissions before 2050.

Chris Philp, the Conservative Party vice-chairman for policy, said the proposals would “put businesses at risk and leave ordinary working people paying the price with higher taxes, more debt and fewer jobs”.

Momentum’s decision to shift its focus towards policy creation represents a potentially major moment in the party’s direction.

Becky Boumelha, a spokesman for the group, said: “Radical and transformational policy can’t only come from the halls of Westminster. It must come from and draw upon the collective wisdom

of Labour’s half a million members, who live and work in every community across the country.”

Momentum – which will also push to abolish all migrant detention centres – will now try to persuade constituency branches to support specific motions at the next conference in September.

A Labour Party spokesman would not comment on the merits of any of the policy proposals but said: “We are proud that our mass social movement for the many, not the few determines policy democratically at our annual conference.”