CONSERVATIVE leader David Cameron visited Liverpool and pledged Tory support for continuing job creation schemes aimed at helping young people who have “slipped through the cracks” get back into work.

Mr Cameron and his entourage descended on Merseystride, a social enterprise helping the long-term unemployed in Everton.

And, after meeting young people who had secured work at the Great Homer Street site assembling and selling furniture, Mr Cameron said he had been “inspired” by what he had seen.

He said the Government’s Future Jobs Fund programme – aimed at 16 to 24-year-olds struggling to find work – was a “good scheme.”

But he said a Conservative Government would more closely involve the private and voluntary sectors in its tackling of the youth employment gap.

He added: “Any good scheme we will keep, and obviously when it comes to the whole area of getting people back to work, our work programme, which includes mentoring and work training for young people, it will have all those elements.

“I think the difference between us and the Government is we are more emphatic about involving the charity, voluntary and private sector, because we believe when it comes to helping people back to work we need to help those who need the most help.

“If you just have targeted state action, you just help the easily employed whereas this place helps those who are difficult to employ.”