The Government will face a ‘tough challenge’ if it wants to meet its targets on unemployment in the UK, according to MPs.

Although employment levels are currently at their highest level since the 1970s, with 74.7% of Britons in work, the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) aims to increase this figure to 80%.

A cross-party group of MPs however, has criticised the DWP for their ‘failure to plan properly’ for this, following a report published by the Commons public accounts committee.

According to the report, the three million workless households in Britain cost the Government around £12.7bn a year in welfare benefits.

‘The DWP has to help some 1.6 million people who have been out of work for a long time find jobs,’ said Committee chairman Edward Leigh.

This would include getting one million people off incapacity benefits and 300,000 single parents back into the workplace.

The report claimed that this would be ‘no easy task’ as those who had been out of work for a substantial period would have to overcome ‘multiple barriers,’ including skills shortages, caring responsibilities and disability.

Mr Leigh went on to emphasise that problems need to be dealt with at an early stage, ‘before the pattern of being unemployed becomes entrenched.’