Four in ten British pupils cannot do sums, says Unicef

Forty per cent of British pupils aged 14 or 15 cannot add up properly, according to the findings of an international study published yesterday.

In addition, the Unicef report on literacy, maths and science standards in 24 developed nations labelled the UK's adult illiteracy rate of 10 per cent as a "statistic of shame".

The study coincided with an admission by Margaret Hodge, the minister for Higher Education, that there was "unease" over maths teaching in schools and her appointment of a senior professor to chair an inquiry into how the subject is taught from the age of 14. Professor Adrian Smith, principal of Queen Mary, University of London, and former professor of maths at Nottingham University, will head the inquiry into the post-14 maths curriculum.

Unicef found that overall Britain ranked seventh in the league table and fared better than every other European country, with the exception of Finland and Austria. It was strongest in science.

The report found Britain to be one of seven nations to have more than 42 per cent of children aged 14 or 15 "unable to apply basic maths knowledge" and one of several of the world's richer nations to have an adult illiteracy rate of 10 per cent.

Many nations, including Britain, Canada, New Zealand and the United States, were found to have had this level or higher of illiteracy among young adults stretching back over the past two decades.

"Given the deepening disadvantage implied by illiteracy in an age of information, an illiteracy rate of one in 10 in any industrialised nation is a statistic of shame," the report added. It said Britain had the highest percentage of youngsters unable to answer relatively simple questions in arithmetic, with 49 per cent failing to answer correctly.

Britain also did badly in having a higher than average performance gap between the brightest and poorest of pupils, ranking 16th in this category.

The report also found a "striking relationship" in Britain between home advantage and school achievement.It said: "The chart shows that schools with a high percentage of students from economically disadvantaged backgrounds also have significantly poorer examination results."

The survey showed South Korea and Japan at the top of almost every table. Germany, extolled until recently as one of the best examples of an efficient education system, came only 19th and had almost twice the British rate of failure in key academic skills.

Norway and Denmark, traditionally high-taxing and high-spending countries with well developed public services, came in the lower half of the league table. Spain, Italy, Greece and Portugal occupied the bottom four positions.