The government has vowed to introduce a £50 million drive to implement more cadet units in state schools, as Chancellor George Osborne’s delivered the first fully-Conservative Budget in the House of Commons since 1996.

Encouraging recently retired people to go into teaching could help to solve teacher shortages in key academic subjects, Education Secretary Nicky Morgan has said.

The design and technology GCSE has been reworked in order to move away from separate material areas to a single qualification title.

The government has offered clarification for what criteria it will use to judge a school as ’coasting’, with secondary schools that fail ensure 60 per cent of pupils earn five A*-C grades at GCSE including Maths and English facing intervention and possible academy conversion.

The Mayor of London will launch a report recommending that children in the UK should build up at least a 100 hours of careers advice or work experience by the age of 16.