The coalition Government has been urged to stick to its ambitious apprenticeship programme, following the disappointing news that the number of young people not in education, employment or training has topped one million for the first time.

The call was made by Richard Grice, Managing Director of Pera Training, the UKs leading provider of manufacturing apprenticeships.

Mr Grice said that while the figures were very disappointing the Government was right to press ahead with its programme to boost apprenticeships and training if they were to deliver sustainable growth.

And in a surprise endorsement of the Government’s apprenticeship programme, David Miliband appeared to back the scheme on BBC Newsnight, during a debate on how to tackle youth unemployment with Works and Pensions Minister Chris Grayling.

Last year the Government announced an additional half a billion pounds for apprenticeships and training in an effort to up-skill the UK’s workforce and increase the number of placements by 50,000 in the first year and 150,000 by 2020.

Currently just 28 per cent of UK employees qualify for an apprenticeship compared to 51 per cent of the workforce in France and 65 per cent in Germany. By opening up the eligibility criteria and allowing workers to retrain in a different sector at level 4, would put the UK on course to achieve 50 per cent, just behind France.

And the extra Government cash has already borne fruit with an additional 114,000 apprenticeship starts in the last 12 months and this figure looks set to increase.

The Government also hopes that the apprenticeship programme will help address the skills deficit, which it says is holding back growth. The British workforce is less skilled than that of France, Japan, Germany and the US. Coupled to this are poor literacy and numeracy rates, with around one fifth of adults being functionally illiterate or innumerate. This skills deficit helps to explain why British workers are around 15 per cent less productive than their international counterparts.

Mr Grice said, "Apprenticeships provide a real opportunity to tackle the one million NEETs. Apprenticeships deliver real benefits to companies, by ensuring a motivated and skilled workforce.

"That is why some of Britain’s best known companies, like Jaguar Land Rover have committed to employing thousands of apprentices. Already our work with JLR has delivered over 1,000 apprentices at their Halewood plant in Merseyside. With further partnerships in the West Midlands JLR will have created around 3,500 manufacturing jobs in a couple of years.

"If the Government is determined to tackle the problems of NEETs then it must continue its’ unremitting campaign to boost the number of companies taking on apprentices, up skilling their work force and investing in new products that will mean UK Plc is ideally placed to exploit every commercial opportunities."