I dispair, as Untitled says if someone has got the 16 without the basics then there is little hope.
I also disagree with this 18 lark, let people who are not academic go and earn a crust, nothing wrong with that. Of course need to stop the shirkers so no job back to education, or whatever.
Personally I would like to see a lot more done for apprenticeships and less done for 'academics' which in many 'uni' cases is anything but.
I also find it odd, baring I suspect many are doing it simply to pick a fight with TTT, that people dont understand what TTT means by 'method'. If you are unaware of the existence of the 'method' you wont even think of asking Google or if you did you probably wont be able to do something with the answer.
Perhaps the way forward is to understand how people get through the system without basic maths.