I fully agree with ITCZ - especially the last sentence !!!
Tom's training sounds good to me, up to the point of reducing an engine to idle after V1. That I would consider a punishable offence, if it was done to me. I t is simply endangering everybody on board, and it is exactly what simulators have been invented for.
Hand flying raw data is normal ops and every pilot should be able to do it - I just found out after switching from seven years of A340 to a CRJ, how hard it was to do a proper job of flying a simple ILS. But flying longhaul, it is not really fun to do some hand flying if you are fatigued after 12 hours.
I practice regularily now, when traffic is light or when going to airfields who still let you fly a visual. The practice is also lived by the copilots, who will ask before switching to manual, if one is ok with the increased workload of monitoring the PF. My company has it in the books, that every pilot should be able to use the apropriate amount of automation, and easily switch between the various levels. The training department encourages hand flying during line training.
However, never, ever, a failure of any kind is simulated on the line, as this would take redundancy out of a fully functional system, and as stated above, is considered "endangering air traffic" in the penal code, aside from being irresponsible and simply stupid.
Nic