DAVID CAMERON was under fire last night after hailing a “brilliant” Liverpool scheme for the young jobless – despite vowing to axe the programme that funds it.

The Conservative leader heaped praise on “Home By Merseystride”, a social enterprise project in Everton where the long-term unemployed repair and assemble damaged furniture for re-sale.

On a visit this week, Mr Cameron spoke of how he was “inspired” by its achievements and of how such projects could help heal the “broken Britain” that will be one of his key election themes.

The following day, he told a London audience: “I went to a brilliant social enterprise in Liverpool called Home By Merseystride. This is exactly the sort of thing we need to spread across the country.”

But the Daily Post can reveal that 36 staff at the Great Homer Street site – around three-quarters of the workforce – were recruited under the Government’s flagship “Future Jobs Fund”.

Last year, the Conservatives voted against the £1bn funding for the scheme, which aimed to put 100,000 jobless people, mainly 18 to 24-year-olds, back to work.

The Tories attacked the Future Jobs Fund for primarily creating jobs through the local councils - rather than private firms – describing them as “make-work jobs”.

And they pledged to replace all Labour’s “failing schemes” with a single Work Programme, run by private and voluntary providers.