THE soaring number of office workers selfishly dying at their desks is costing Britain £2.6bn a year, a new report has found. 

Mel Stride, secretary for work and pensions, has hit out at staff who expire without even finishing their allotted work and drag Britain’s productivity down.

He said: “A quarter of us have had to cover for those who turn up and then cease to draw breath. Catching up on their emails, answering their phones, ignoring the sweet, sickly odour of their decay.

“Without tackling this, we risk falling even further behind the US and China where even the dead complete their contracted hours and then stay until 9pm for unpaid overtime. And never ask to work from home.”

Martin Bishop, a business consultant from Peterborough, was midway through an important client meeting last month when one of his co-workers decided to die.

He said: “At first I sneakily booted his shins under the desk to stop him going towards the light. Then, on the pretext of borrowing a pen, I leaned over and punched him five or six times in the chest to restart his heart. Did the lazy bugger bother? Did he f**k.

He added: “The clients left without saying a word, and I haven’t spoken to my colleague since. He’s still sat there but I’m not phoning an undertaker until I get an apology.”

Call centre manager Grace Wood-Morris said: “If you’re going to die at work notify your team leader in advance and for goodness sake don’t slink off to the toilets where your putrefying remains won’t be discovered until the height of summer.

“When I’m dragging your bloated corpse outside in the middle of a heatwave, you can piss off if you think you’re getting a reference.”