The furlough scheme will be extended across the UK until the end of March, Chancellor Rishi Sunak has confirmed.

The BBC reported that Mr Sunak said the scheme will pay up to 80% of a person's wage up to £2,500 a month. He told the Commons that the government will review the policy in January.

The chancellor said his intention was "to give businesses security through the winter" to “protect millions of jobs.”

The furlough scheme, or Job Retention Scheme, subsidises the wages of people who cannot do their jobs, either because their workplace is closed or because there is no longer enough work for them.

Mr Sunak said it would apply throughout the UK, saying the country had "a Treasury for the whole of the United Kingdom".

As part of the revised scheme, anyone made redundant after 23 September can be rehired and put back on furlough.

The Job Support Scheme - a less generous form of support that had originally been set to replace the furlough scheme in November - has now been postponed.

Source: BBC News