Britain will urge people this week to get back to their places of work, ramping up Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s calls to revive the economy after its hammering during the coronavirus lockdown.
The government will launch a media campaign to explain to workers that they will be safe if they return to their offices and other places of employment.
THE COUNTRY’S ECONOMIC OUTPUT SHRANK BY MORE THAN 20 PERCENT
Data has shown only 17% of workers in British cities had returned to their workplaces by early August, and one business leader said last week that big urban centers looked like ghost towns.
The government hopes that reopening schools, which began in England this week, will allow parents to go back to their workplaces after working from home since March in many cases.
“People are going back to the office in huge numbers across our country and quite right too,” Johnson said. Johnson also said the government would keep a grip on any increase in infections: “We are absolutely confident that we are going to be able to deal with those outbreaks.”
Britain’s economic output shrank by more than 20% in the April-June period, the most severe contraction among large industrialized nations, and there are signs that recovery has been modest so far.