Britain's bosses have launched a fierce attack on calls to improve the "work-life balance" of employees.

In a report issued on Monday, the Institute of Directors said some campaigners appeared to be comparing modern businesses with the "dark satanic mills" of William Blake.

Forum Response: Institute of Directors

Ruth Lea, head of the policy unit and author of the paper, said: "Everyone should be able to balance their work lives and home and family lives satisfactorily. British employers know this and are some of the most flexible in the world.

"But the work-life balance protagonists ignore this and run an anti-business agenda that seems hell-bent on demonising the workplace with a collection of, for want of a better phrase, 'urban myths'

"These urban myths are gross distortions of the truth but, alas, they go unchallenged all too often. Moreover, the work-life language is subliminally anti-business as it suggests that, somehow, the opposite of 'life' (good thing) is 'work' (bad thing).

"Unfortunately, the work-life balance agenda is behind many of the government's 'family friendly' regulations, which make it ever harder to run a business. Perhaps it wouldn't be so bad if they were the only extra employment regulations introduced by a highly interventionist government - but they're not."

Forum Response: The Work Foundation

Yvonne Bennion, policy specialist for the Work Foundation, told ePolitix.com: "The point about work-life balance is to make sure that the best pool of talent is available to employers. This is not about being nice to people, this is about making sure that the country is best equipped to be competitive in world markets.

"It is essential that we improve our productivity. We will not do this by sticking to traditional working practices that at worst keep bright and experienced people out of the labour market, or at best fracture their career paths.

"There are important consequences of new working practises that have yet to be tackled, one of the most important remains adequate childcare.

"Whatever the law says, this is still holding back many capable people from playing their part in the labour market."

Forum Response: Barclays

A spokesman for Barclays told ePolitix.com: "At Barclays we believe that by encouraging a positive work-life balance, we will both attract and retain the best work-force.

"We are committed to diversity and have measurable five year targets with the aim of ensuring our workforce fully represents our customer base.

"To ensure that we recruit and retain the best people from the widest pool, requires a flexible approach, based on a partnership between the employer and the employee with reasonable support from both parties.

"This is why we have introduced the opportunity for our employees to have career and carer breaks, flexible working, job shares and maternity and paternity benefits that go beyond statutory requirements."