Vocational training provision to be reviewed

The independent review will be led by Professor Alison Wolf, a lecturer of public sector management at King’s College London and a specialist adviser to the House of Commons select committee on education and skills.

Gove said the move has been taken because vocational training has not been given the same "emphasis" as academic subjects.

He said: "This has left a gap in the country’s skills base and, as a result, a shortage of appropriately trained and educated young people to fulfil the needs of our employers."

Wolf’s remit includes looking at the effectiveness of current vocational training in schools and colleges, and considering how responsive it is to changes in the labour market.

Comparisons will be made with other countries and incentives for young people to take part in vocational training will be considered. Wolf will also look at funding and the role charities and private providers can play in providing training.

The final report is expected next spring after a consultation due to begin later this month.

Wolf said: "Our current arrangements for 14-19 education are highly bureaucratic and inflexible. They also make it very difficult to encourage excellence in anything that is not conventionally academic. Writing about people doing things gets rewarded more than actually doing them."

Chris Keates, general secretary of the teaching union NASUWT, has criticised the review saying that it was "a naked attempt" to promote the role academies and free schools could have in specialising in vocational training.

She added: "The fundamental problem the government is failing to address is the lack of access to high quality jobs and training places for today’s school leavers."

However, school leader association NAHT welcomed the announcement. General secretary Russell Hobby said: "To date, debate about the merits or otherwise of vocational provision has been unproductive because of its often uninformed nature. An independent review led by a respected expert will redress this situation.

"We believe that there is an urgent need to develop a coherent national approach to the provision of vocational education."

Christine Blower, general secretary of the National Union of Teachers, warned against forcing pupils into specific vocational "learning routes" at 14.

She reiterated the union’s calls for a "single, overarching qualification that embraces all young people and does not label them as one thing or another at such a young age".