Londoners to benefit from Microsoft apprenticeships

Microsoft will be creating 1,000 new apprentices in London over the next three years.

The software giant will be increasing the number of positions as part of the Mayor's apprenticeship campaign, which has the goal of creating 20,000 new job opportunities in London by the end of the academic year.

The Mayor of London, Boris Johnson, applauded the decision Microsoft and other companies had made and called on London businesses to take on apprentices to save what he believed "could otherwise become a wasted generation."

The announcement by Johnson came on the day he and the Business Secretary, Vince Cable, announced National Apprenticeship Week.

The new scheme comes shortly after it became public knowledge the number of young jobless rose to 951,000 in November the largest figure since records started in 1992.

This is not the first pledge of employment made by Microsoft this year. In January the company's UK managing director, Gordon Frazer, met with David Cameron and agreed to create jobs for 4,000 people in a push to plug the gap of public sector job cuts.