Ministers expressed concern today after national results revealed a two per cent fall in the number of 14-year-olds who are able to read and write properly.

Tests taken by 600,000 teenagers in England this year showed that only 72 per cent reached the required standard in English, compared to 74 per cent last year.

Boys fared worse than girls across all the tests in English, maths and science, although the disparity between the sexes was greatest in English.

Jim Knight, the schools minister, conceded that the overall two-percentage-point drop in pupils reaching the expected "level five" in the English tests was worrying.

"I’m concerned that English has fallen this year following the very good progress seen last year and despite a 15-percentage-point increase since 1997," said Mr Knight. "We cannot afford to be complacent and need to redouble our efforts to reverse this next year."

The results showed boys continuing to struggle, with girls ahead across all subject areas. The most shocking gap was in the overall grade for English, where only 65 per cent of boys reached level five, compared to 80 per cent of girls. Only 59 per cent of boys made the grade in reading, compared to 74 per cent of girls, and in writing tests 69 per cent of boys met required standards compared to 83 per cent of girls.

Girls were also pulling ahead in the traditionally male area of science, where 73 per cent of girls achieved the expected level, compared to 71 per cent of boys. The gap was smallest in maths, where 77 per cent of girls made the grade and 76 per cent of boys.

Overall, English results were down two points from last year, but science grades were up two per cent and maths were up three per cent.

Sarah Teather, the Liberal Democrat education spokesman, said that the results for English were dreadful. "This is simply unacceptable. That so many boys reach their teens with such poor language skills is utterly depressing. It barely needs saying that without a command of English they will struggle to advance in either further education or work.

"The Government’s overly-prescriptive national curriculum and obsession with testing is not producing results. More time devoted to developing strong speaking and listening skills when children are in primary school would help build confidence and ability with English."

But Mr Knight said that ministers were acting to turn around the problems in English. "We have taken strong steps to ensure standards rise, including almost £1 billion extra for personalised learning to stretch the brightest and help the less able, making phonics the prime approach to boost reading at primary school, and improving the Key Stage 3 curriculum (for 11 to 14-year-olds)," he said.

The Government wants primary schools to return to a traditional method of teaching reading known as "phonics", where children learn individual letter sounds and then how to blend them to form whole words, rather than guessing at words from their context.

Nick Gibb, the Shadow schools minister, said that today's results for reading showed that it was vital to return to phonics. "Both the Opposition and Government are fully behind the return to phonics teaching which we must now ensure is backed by training and funding," he said.

"It is unacceptable that 33 per cent of children at the age of 14 are still not reaching level five in reading. This is an absolute minimum standard that all children need if they are to benefit from secondary education and if they are to survive in the increasingly competitive job market in later life."

Today’s results also showed that the Government’s controversial privately-sponsored academies improved their test results in English by nearly nine percentage points this year, despite the fall nationally. However, at an overall 58 per cent, the academies’ English results were still 14 points below the national average.

The 22 academies included in the Government announcement this year improved their pass rate for maths by 11 points, and 13 points in science.

Lord Adonis, the junior schools minister, said: "These academy results are very encouraging and far bigger than the national rates of improvement. Results in English have bucked the national trend.

"In science, academy results are rising six times faster than the national improvement rate and in maths over three times faster.

"This is evidence, after the strong GCSE results for academies last month, of the substantial progress these new schools have made in a short time."

The academies were set up in an attempt to transform failing comprehensives in some of the poorest parts of the country, but have been criticised by many teachers’ unions and left-wing MPs because they draw on funds from the private sector.

Steve Sinnott, the NUT general secretary, said that the poor English results could be explained by the pressures of modern life. "Peer pressure, technological innovation and just being a teenager in an ever-changing world are leading to pupils reading less and less," he said.

"If these factors are to be countered and the reading habit - with its benefits for good English - developed in our young people, it also must be part of their parents’ culture."

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