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As the beleaguered Conservative party convenes in its conference city for its yearly gathering, it has plenty to consider regarding its next steps. Doubt remains if a road forward is available. We are in difficult days for a governing group that now has very little, if anything, fresh or distinctive to say to voters.

What Could Have Been

The situation might have been so different if real advances had been made on an priority that matters to people across the country: Levelling up. However the previous administration did not possess the first clue on how to turn the trendy talk on social mobility into concrete action. For the two years after the 2019 election, it debated what the phrase actually signified.

I was perplexed, because I’d already told the Prime Minister what levelling up signified when we initially discussed about it during his leadership campaign. This terminology was a term I developed and used at the Department for Education to talk about equal opportunity. It served as our core mission, and its definition is unambiguous: social mobility is the method by which we achieve equal access – not through reducing opportunity away from those who possess it, but rather by extending options to those that lack them.

The Core Concept

An additional vital ministry expression we used, “ability is distributed uniformly across our country, yet chances are not”, served as a purposeful phrase, representing the dual components of a social mobility strategy. Initially, ability distributed uniformly but not developed consistently through our education system. Additionally, opportunities not spread evenly by the private sector or our market. Thus, schools and companies were essential to achieving improved equality of opportunity. This constituted an agenda about the social fabric of our country – fostering people’s potential and connecting them to opportunities.

What Levelling Up Became

How did the social mobility agenda become under Johnson’s Conservatives? A towns fund overseen from the DLUHC. Hanging baskets and rearranged intersections. A white paper was released nearly three years after the Prime Minister took office, which saw ongoing initiatives rebadged under the fresh social mobility slogan.

Therefore, a broader social mobility agenda went unpursued, as well as all the reform that it could have inspired – in funding, enterprise, economic policy, taxation and in local regeneration. Additionally, in schooling, including a higher education sector that has become a scapegoat for leaders across parties – although it remains the primary vehicle of social mobility for youth from modest backgrounds, personally, this country has had over the past 30 years. Maybe the only engine of fair chances, working extensively.

The Importance of Aspiration

Ambition is essential for our country to prosper. For hope to exist, there needs to be a credible sense that effort and reward are related; that if people dream big, they can achieve. For political leadership, being able to foster a outlook of positivity about the future is critical. Studies by the research body at the university and others, published last month, showed that the education department’s targeted regions I launched while in office – community-focused methods to improving education outcomes – led to young people in those communities being up to 18 percentage points more hopeful about their life ahead than those in comparable communities without these schemes in place. The evidence is clear: just making an sincere effort on equal chance initiatives can rapidly and effectively change how people feel about their destiny.

Lost Potential

Ignoring this evidence, and in the throes of its post-Johnson leadership contest, in that period, the Tory administration closed opportunity areas down. What reason would someone in those regions vote for a party that took that action? The opportunity areas policy is one example of what could have been a revolutionary Tory policy platform on levelling up, but that opportunity was hopelessly squandered. Methods such as this can generate optimism and ambition. Conversely, as the Conservatives discovered, breaking the promise of fair chances is the costliest mistake any leadership can make. The public held accountable the leadership for its incompetence but, above all, for its unfulfilled commitments on social mobility.

Present Circumstances

At present the responsibility on life chances and equal chances has passed to a opposition party. The previous terminology has been abandoned. Labour has its own policy language of “eliminating hurdles to advancement”. The party that is gradually replacing the hapless Tories, Reform UK, also has its own message – “economic renewal”. It’s a phrase to talk about additional chances in areas like the one I come from, in the region. It promises that an former economic strength can be reborn into an industrial future.

To the electorate, it must appear as a déjà vu experience. Similar challenge, different language. However, so far, no progress.

Lessons for the Future

Whether the government and opposition want to escape the similar destiny, both these parties should learn from the previous government’s errors on levelling up; that equal opportunity talk is simple terminology, but actual achievement of more equal results is much harder. Our nation’s persistently low social mobility remains the central problem for our country, with the next generation unable to get a good job beginning, those putting in effort in occupations with few results after the rent has been paid, and citizens throughout the UK without any genuine belief their next generation will be able to do any better in life than they have.

Politicians can mention equal chances repeatedly. But where is the organization that has the comprehensive policy agenda on life chances? None appear to exist. Whichever party succeeds initially, prevails. Not just for their organization, but, more importantly, for a complete society that has urgently needs equality of opportunity so urgently.