[Scarlett.]

Britain's ‘sloth-inducing’ labour laws and lavish welfare system are at the root of the country’s economic malaise, a senior member of the Chinese government warned last night.

Jin Liqun, chairman of the country’s vast sovereign wealth fund, China Investment Corporation, said people in the West needed to ‘work a bit harder’ if they wanted to escape the recession.

In a tough message to EU leaders Mr Jin said Westerners were cossetted by the welfare state.

He said the debt crisis crippling Europe could be solved in the long term only by slashing welfare payments and ending the restrictive labour laws which have made European workers increasingly uncompetitive on world markets.

Mr Jin told Channel Four News: ‘The root cause of trouble is the overburdened welfare system, built up since the Second World War in Europe – the sloth- inducing, indolence-inducing labour laws.

'People need to work a bit harder, they need to work a bit longer, and they should be more innovative. We [the Chinese] work like crazy.’

The average working week in China is 47 hours, compared with roughly 40 hours in the UK and just 30 in some EU countries. But Chinese workers earn just a tenth of what Europeans are paid.

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/arti...#ixzz1bJvZNs8Q

Better having 'sloth inducing' labour laws than having 8 year old kids working in factories for nothing