Update: 12:45

Institute of Directors calls for German school model
Government should abandon its higher education participation target and focus on expanding vocational education, employers have said. Ruth Lea, director of policy for the Institute of Directors, called for the introduction of vocational and academic streaming in secondary schools along the lines of the German educational model. She said that the government's focus on expanding higher education, to 50 per cent of 18 to 30-year-olds by 2010, devalued the sort of vocational skills employers are crying out for.