Employment Minister Andrew Smith conceded at a news conference on Thursday that it was "extraordinary" there was no means of checking the success of the 33,000 companies who have signed up to the £580 million welfare-to-work project.

Andrew Smith: "No means of telling - but blame the Tories"

But Mr Smith blamed the problem on the previous government, and insisted the flagship programme was working well and helped more than 69,000 young people into jobs, training or work experience.

Asked how many firms had taken on a New Dealer, he admitted: "Thanks to the woeful management information systems we inherited from the Tories there is no means of telling."

Shadow education and employment spokesman Damian Green said the New Deal was entirely a New Labour project, and it was "genuinely disturbing that they are spending the best part of £600m where they cannot collect one of the most basic pieces of information".

He added: "It beggars belief that they don't know how many employers have taken on a single new person. The figures are clearly in chaos."

'Costly failure' analysis

The spat over the figures followed the publication of an analysis of the New Deal by Mr Green.

Damian Green: "New Deal reality has not matched its ambitions"

In a pamphlet for the Centre for Policy Studies he argues that the scheme, aimed at the young unemployed, is an expensive flop costing taxpayers more than £11,000 per job created.

This makes the New Deal far more expensive than other schemes to move people off benefits and into work, according to the study.

Mr Green calculates that the cost of each subsidised job taken up by an 18-24-year-old adds up to £37,7000.

In contrast the cost-per-job is £443 for Jobclubs, £282 for the Restart programme and £4,617 for Training for Work.

Up to now 9,000 young people have got jobs subsidised by the New Deal. Employers are paid £60 a week for six months as an incentive if they take on a young unemployed person, and are also given an additional £750 towards training.

Government figures say 30,000 jobs for the long-term young unemployed have been created so far - if unsubsidised jobs taken up before the New Deal came into effect are included.

Using official figures Mr Green, a former Downing Street policy advisor to John Major, says 20% of young people who leave the New Deal do so with no job and having received no education or training from the scheme.

And 24% of those coming out of the New Deal without a job return to benefits.

The MP cites local figures showing that of the 306 young unemployed in Westminster who joined the New Deal, one has a job.

And of 277 New Dealers in West Lothian, 10 have a job.

Mr Green concludes that the New Deal, which formed the centrepiece of Labour's election campaign, is an expensive failure that has left employers either unwilling to sign up to the scheme or frustrated by its inadequacies.

"It is clear that the ambitions invested in the New Deal have not been matched in reality," he said.

'Grotesque distortion'

Labour dismissed his study as "a grotesque distortion", insisting the New Deal was proving a success.

Mr Smith said: "Long-term youth unemployment is now at its lowest for over 20 years, down by over a quarter since the New Deal started nationally in April," he said.

"It is still very early in the process - the New Deal is a long term investment - but these initial findings are positive."