The leader of the Unite union has welcomed the announcement today (Tuesday) by the Chancellor Rishi Sunak that the job retention scheme will be extended in its present form until July, then tapered from August until October.

“The Chancellor’s announcement will be a welcome relief to households across the country. The job retention scheme is as crucial to battling and defeating this virus as the public health measures that we have also been campaigning for.

“Of course, we’ll need to look at the detail when published but today’s announcement is a message again to employers that the government will stand behind them if they stand behind their workers. There should be no rush to redundancies.”