THE World Cup football offered a chastening reminder that our country lacks the skills to compete with the best in the world.

Businesses I speak to complain that the talent pool in the North-East, notably in specialist and emerging industries, is as shallow as the group England had to choose from.

England’s feeble efforts in Brazil were a dent to national pride, but the failure to equip our young people with the skills to help drive growing businesses is shameful and hampering the country’s growth prospects.

The figures are worrying.

Between 2011 and 2013, investment in training by employers fell by £2.4bn, and the number of job vacancies without qualified applicants rose from 91,000 to 146,000. Nissan has 1,000 applicants applying for training 20 posts, making the Sunderland car factory a tougher place to gain entry to than many Oxbridge colleges.

Apprenticeships are offered by 20 per cent of employers in England and 51 per cent in Germany.

Only 61,000 new apprenticeships were for young people last year, whereas in Germany, 570,000 new apprenticeships are for youngsters England’s vocational system has 18,000 qualifications of varying quality, while Germany has 330, which are rigorously assessed.

The quality of apprenticeships and technical education must improve so employers respect the qualification.

In addition, information about apprenticeships must be better to allow school-leavers and their parents to make an informed choice.

New skills minister Nick Boles has his work cut out. On the plus side, he clearly sees the benefit of improving one’s abilities. He hit the headlines a couple of years ago when it emerged that he’d charged taxpayers for lessons he took to learn his partner’s language, Hebrew.

At the time, he defended the £678 cost as “something I’m entitled to do”

but Matthew Sinclair, of the Taxpayers’ Alliance, accused the Tory MP of abusing a perk to make conversation at the breakfast table easier.

What impact he will make to boost skills in the North-East remains to be seen. In any case, it’s more important that we tackle the problem ourselves.

This month’s Growth Fund deals promised cash to schemes that will be vital to train workers for emerging industries.

The region’s Leps have made skills an integral part of their objectives, while trainers are working closer with local businesses to tailor their efforts to what industry needs.

It won’t happen overnight, but these are vital steps towards competing globally.