A series of marking errors may have seen hundreds of trainee teachers pass literacy and numeracy tests - allowing them to go on and land teaching jobs in UK schools.

Before April 2012 these tests were administered and marked by the Training and Development Agency. Now they are the responsibility of the Teaching Agency, which merged into the National College for Teaching Leadership in April 2013. Retrospectively, it has been revealed that more than 700 candidates were incorrectly awarded marks leading to an unwarranted pass - dating back to April 2010.

Conversely, a further 27 trainee teachers were judged to have failed tests they should have passed, ending some teaching careers as some candidates did not have any subsequent attempts.

The errors were revealed by schools minister David Laws, who said the people who had been incorrectly failed would be awarded retrospective passes.

However, no action would be taken over the candidates who had been wrongly judged to have passed the tests.

In a written statement, Mr Laws said: "With respect to those candidates who were incorrectly awarded a pass, many will have subsequently gone on to undertake the other steps necessary to gain Qualified Teacher Status, or be in the process of doing so, and will, through this, have had to demonstrate their competence to teach.

"Given these points we are satisfied that no further action in respect of these people is required, indeed it would be unjust to them to do so."

The schools minister explained extensive data analysis and six months would have been needed to determine exactly how many students were affected by the errors prior to October 2012 and that would not be a good use of taxpayers' money.

Since the errors came to light, the Standards and Testing Agency's chief executive has assured the government the tests are now "reliable, accurate and fit for purpose."