BRITAIN will be at the mercy of the "tiger economies" of India and China unless firms adopted better working practices, the head of telecoms giant BT will warn today.

Sir Christopher Bland threw his weight behind a drive to encourage companies to adopt "smarter" working practices.

He will tell a conference in London that China and India were already major economic players, adding: "This region is investing so heavily in technology and education that it will outstrip anything we have seen to date both in terms of reduced costs and product differentiation. We will be left standing if we don't change our cost structures."

Bureaucracy

BT was attempting the complete transformation of the way it operated, disposing of as much bureaucracy and unnecessary control as possible, the chairman will say.

Sir Christopher will say: "We already have more than 11,500 home based workers, tens of thousands of nomadic workers and millions of customers who either already do, or soon will, work in this way."

Flexible working could cut the worst peak traffic by up to 10 per cent within five years, according to research for the RAC Foundation.

Travel

Executive director Edmund King will tell the conference billions of miles of travel could be saved every year if more people worked from home.

The potential for millions of people to work from home or vary their hours was "considerable", according to Mr King, who will say: "If enough companies adopt it, then rush hours would ease, road congestion reduce and overcrowding on public transport lessen."

Many people spend more than three extra working weeks a year commuting, with those in London and the South East often enduring twice that, according to the RAC.

Business and union leaders will attend today's conference, organised by Work Wise, an organisation set up to encourage flexible working.

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