Should compulsory academic education finish at 14, not 16?

In an effort to deal with a shortage of young people with good vocational skills, the current government is planning to permit children to leave school at 14, should they then wish to study a vocational course at one of 12 specialist colleges.

According to the Tory Peer, Lord Baker of Dorking, former Education Secretary, 14 is a good age to be making career choices: 'Eleven is too soon to chose, 16 is too late;14 is the right age of transfer'.
However, Christine Blower, the General Secretary of the NUT disagrees, stating: 'It is not acceptable that at the age of 14 pupils may be forced into specific learning routes which could restrict their education or career choices. Attempting to separate technical or vocational education from mainstream schools is socially divisive and will lead to a 2-tier system with technical schools being seen as the poor cousin.'

This proposal from the coalition government comes after the former Labour Education Minister, Estelle Morris, claimed that more students would stay in education if GCSEs were sat at 14, not 16, with those who wanted to pursue non-academic, vocational skills, having the opportunity to study relevant courses at a younger age.

Some will say that such a proposal will give those children who are more practically minded, a better chance of securing a career earlier in life, rather than encouraging them to stay on in 'main-stream' academic education and end up with a 'fluffy and worthless' degree from a half-baked 'university'. Whilst others will say this will widen class divisions even more than they are at present. What do you think?