Workers will be encouraged to return to the office as part of a major media campaign to be launched by the government next week.

The campaign will promote the government’s aim to reduce the number of employees working from home amid fears that town and city centres are becoming ghost areas as workers stay away.

The drive follows warnings of “devastating consequences” for town and city centres as analysis of mobile phone data shows that just 17% of workers have returned to their offices, no more than at the end of June.

According to the Telegraph this morning ministers are to warn that continuing to work from home could make staff ‘vulnerable’ to being sacked.

Yesterday Dame Carolyn Fairbairn head of the CBI said that allowing staff to work from home had helped keep firms afloat during the pandemic.But as offices stood empty, thousands of local businesses that relied on the passing trade were suffering.

She said getting people back into offices and workplaces should be “as important” as the return to school, and directly appealed to Boris Johnson to “do more to build confidence”.

This could include using “effective test and trace” systems or a campaign to encourage commuters back on to public transport.

Lucy Powell MP, Labour’s Shadow Minister for Business and Consumers, said:

“It beggars belief that the Government are threatening people like this during a pandemic. Forcing people to choose between their health and their job is unconscionable. Number 10 should condemn this briefing and categorically rule out any such campaign.”

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