As the beleaguered Tories meets in its conference city for its annual party conference, it has a lot to reflect on regarding its path forward. Doubt remains if a clear direction exists at all. We are in difficult days for a political party that now has little, if anything, fresh or distinctive to say to the electorate.
The Missed Opportunity
The situation might have been so different if concrete steps had been made on an priority that is important for people across the country: Levelling up. But the previous administration did not possess the slightest idea on how to convert his zeitgeisty rhetoric on levelling up into policy reality. During the initial period after the 2019 election, it discussed what the term actually signified.
It seemed strange to me, because I had clearly defined for Johnson what levelling up entailed when we initially discussed about it during his leadership campaign. This terminology was a concept I originated and used at the Department for Education to talk about equal opportunity. It was our core mission, and its purpose is unambiguous: levelling up is the means by which we attain equal access – without removing opportunity away from those who possess it, but rather by expanding options to those that lack them.
The Core Concept
An additional vital education department term we used, “ability is distributed uniformly throughout the nation, however access isn’t”, served as a purposeful phrase, representing the two halves of a social mobility strategy. First, potential shared equally but not cultivated evenly through our learning institutions. Additionally, opportunities not spread evenly by employers or our economic system. As a result, learning and employment were crucial to achieving improved equality of opportunity. This constituted an agenda about the societal structure of our country – fostering human talent and providing access to prospects.
The Actual Outcome
What did the social mobility agenda evolve into under the Tory administration? Regional development money administered out of the the relevant ministry. Street beautification and rearranged intersections. A white paper was published nearly three years after the Prime Minister took office, which saw existing policy approaches rebadged under the recently branded agenda.
As a result, a comprehensive equal opportunity plan went unpursued, as well as all the improvement that it may have generated – in investment, enterprise, financial planning, taxation and in place-making. And, of course, in education, including a higher education sector that has become a target for elected officials – despite the fact that it remains the primary vehicle of upward movement for youth from modest backgrounds, including myself, this country has had throughout modern times. Maybe the only engine of fair chances, working extensively.
The Role of Ambition
Aspiration is vital for our country to thrive. For hope to exist, there needs to be a realistic expectation that dedication and outcome are related; that if people aspire, they can attain. For any government, being able to foster a feeling of hope about the future is critical. Analysis by the Institute for Policy Research at the university and others, published last month, showed that the education department’s targeted regions I introduced as education secretary – place-based approaches to improving education outcomes – led to young people in those areas being up to 18 percentage points more hopeful about their future than those in equivalent locations without these schemes in place. The data shows: just making an genuine beginning on pro-social mobility policy can quickly and positively change how people perceive their future.
Lost Potential
Oblivious to this, and in the throes of its new leader election, in that period, the Conservative government terminated the programmes. Why should any person in those communities vote for a political group that made that decision? The opportunity areas policy is one example of what might have become a game-changing Conservative government agenda on levelling up, but that chance was hopelessly squandered. Approaches such as this can inspire hope and aspiration. In contrast, as the Tories discovered, failing to deliver of fair chances is the costliest mistake any government can make. The public held accountable the administration for its ineffectiveness but, above all, for its failed pledges on levelling up.
The Current Landscape
Currently the mandate on equal opportunity and equal chances has been taken up by a opposition party. The levelling up rhetoric has been abandoned. The new government has its own political rhetoric of “removing obstacles to success”. The organization that is increasingly displacing the failing Tories, the alternative party, also has its own language – “economic renewal”. The terminology to talk about fresh prospects in regions like the one I was raised in, in the region. It claims that an historical manufacturing base can revive into an revitalized economy.
To the electorate, it must seem like a déjà vu experience. Identical problem, different language. Yet, currently, little improvement.
Lessons for the Future
Should the current and alternative parties want to avoid the same fate, both these parties should understand the Tories’ mistakes on social mobility; that social mobility rhetoric is one thing, but effective implementation of more equal results is far more challenging. Our nation’s endemically weak life chances remains the primary challenge for our country, with young people unable to get a good job beginning, those putting in effort in full-time jobs with minimal progress after the rent has been paid, and individuals nationwide without any genuine belief their offspring will be able to do any better in life than they have.
Elected officials can discuss fairer opportunities as much as they want. But where is the party that has the thorough strategy on social mobility? None appear to exist. Whichever party succeeds initially, prevails. Not just for their party, but, crucially, for a complete society that has desperately requires equality of opportunity so desperately.
