"We need a four-day week so that people can enjoy their lives, have more time with their families, and maybe reduce high blood pressure because people might start exercising on that extra day.
"If you've got two people in a couple working, they need to be able to work in such a way that they can spend time together with their children. It's a nightmare," said Ashton, who worked in the NHS for 42 years until he retired last year.
"My concern is that too many people are working too long hours and too hard, and too many people aren't working at all. A large number of people are working crazy hours and a significant amount of people can't get work," Ashton said.
"It [a four-day week] is viable. We need an ambition in the next 10 to 20 years to move to that on a European level. We've had the European working-time directive. Why couldn't we have the ambition to move to a four-day week? The fifth day could be a community activity day, a giving back day. This is how you operationalise the big society," he said.