article_snippet.sent: Labour will ban bosses employing regular staff on zero-hours contracts for any longer than 12 weeks.
article_snippet.sent: Ed Miliband announced the zero-hours contract ban to workers at David Brown Gear Systems in Huddersfield this morning .
article_snippet.sent: Ed Miliband announcement comes after David Cameron struggled to say if David Cameron could live on a zero-hours contract after being grilled by Jeremy Paxman last week.
article_snippet.sent: Ed Miliband said there had been an 'epidemic' of zero-hours contracts under the Coalition and dismissed fears scrapping the Coalition could force companies to lay off staff.
article_snippet.sent: It is estimated there are now 1.8million contracts in the UK that do not guarantee any hours – with as many as one in seven jobs now zero-hours.
article_snippet.sent: ONS data shows that 58 per cent of people on zero-hours contracts have been with people on zero-hours contracts current employer for over a year, and that workers on the contracts work 23 hours a week on average.
article_snippet.sent: The Labour Party leader   said most businesses did not use zero-hours contracts, but added: 'The trouble is for some businesses this has become the primary way that most businesses employ people and I don't think it's the right way forward for our country. '
article_snippet.sent: Zero hour contracts are just one example of the insecurity of our economy and what has happened over the last five years.
article_snippet.sent: The Tories have already announced that The Tories would ban exclusivity clauses which stop staff on zero-hours contracts from working for other companies.
article_snippet.sent: Jeremy Paxman grilled David Cameron over the number of zero-hours contracts in the UK workforce .
article_snippet.sent: But Mr Miliband told Labour activists later today: 'The problem of zero-hours contracts is at the heart of the key question in this election: who does our country work for? '
article_snippet.sent: Christian May, of the Institute of Directors said zero-hours contracts were used by just '2 per cent of workers' which he said could 'hardly be described as an epidemic'.
highlights_snippet.sent: Comes after the PM struggled to say if Labour leader could live on zero-hours contract .