A consultation has been launched on a new regulation that will give workers the right to ask their employers for time in which to train.

The aim of the government consultation is to find out how the entitlement can best be implemented.

Ministers believe that the new right, which may be in place by 2010, could see as many as 300,000 employees in England receiving training each year.

It is estimated by the government that a third of employers do not train their staff and that eight million employees get no kind of training at all every year.

The Department for Innovation, Universities and Skills (DIUS) plans that the new right would operate in the same way as the right to request flexible working currently does. It will apply to all employees who have worked for their employer for 26 weeks, covering up to 22 million workers in England.

Under the rules, employees will be granted a legal right to ask their employer to give them time away from their mainstream duties to take relevant training, a request which their employers would be required to consider seriously.

Requests may be for joining accredited programmes that lead to a qualification, or for unaccredited training to help employees develop a specific skill relevant to their job. In both cases, the only requirement would be that the training should help improve business performance and productivity.

Although employers will not be obliged to agree to the requests, they will need to base any refusals on justifiable business grounds, including circumstances where they did not feel that the training would help improve business performance.

The training could be paid for by the employer, the employee, the government or by a combination of the three.

Government funding could come through the Train to Gain scheme, in which investment is expected to rise to £1 billion by 2010.

Launching the consultation, John Denham, the Minister for Innovation, Universities and Skills, said: “Investment by government and employers in education and training has played a large part in building economic success in recent years. Investment in skills is key to ensuring we come through with a stronger economy and making sure individuals can make the most of their abilities.”

Mr Denham added: “But we have still not persuaded every employer of the importance of skills. A third of employers still don’t train their staff. In other organisations training does not involve everyone. The employers who do not train run real risks with their businesses.

“We need to find new ways to bring the drive for skills into every workplace and to every worker which is why we are consulting on a new right for workers to request time to train.”

The consultation will run until 10 September.