As the original author championed levelling up as the critical to Tory electoral victory – but Boris Johnson neglected the agenda. Now look at us.

While the beleaguered Tories convenes in its conference city for its annual party conference, it has a lot to reflect on regarding its future direction. It’s not even clear if a clear direction remains open. We are in challenging circumstances for a governing group that now has very little, if anything, new or unique to say to the public.

The Missed Opportunity

The situation might have been vastly better if concrete steps had been made on an priority that matters to people across the country: Social mobility. However Boris Johnson’s government lacked the basic understanding on how to turn the popular slogan on social mobility into policy reality. Over twenty-four months after the general election, it debated what the phrase even meant.

I was perplexed, because I’d already told the Prime Minister what levelling up entailed when we initially discussed about it during his leadership campaign. This terminology was language I created and used at the DfE to talk about social mobility. This became our guiding principle, and its purpose is unambiguous: levelling up is the method by which we realize equality of opportunity – not by taking prospects away from those who already have it, but rather by extending options to those that lack them.

Essential Principle

An additional vital ministry expression we used, “potential is equally shared across our country, yet chances are not”, again was a intentional wording, reflecting the two parts of a fairness agenda. First, ability distributed uniformly but not developed consistently through our education system. Additionally, chances not distributed fairly by the private sector or our economic system. Therefore, schools and companies were essential to achieving stronger social mobility. This represented an mission about the social fabric of our country – investing in individual capabilities and linking them with chances.

The Reality of Implementation

How did the social mobility agenda turn into under the Tory administration? Regional development money overseen from the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities. Street beautification and redeveloped traffic systems. A white paper was published nearly three years after the leadership change, which saw ongoing initiatives relabelled under the recently branded agenda.

Consequently, a broader social mobility agenda went unpursued, as well as all the improvement that it may have generated – in capital, enterprise, economic policy, tax and in place-making. And, of course, in schooling, including a higher education sector that has become a punchbag for leaders across parties – despite the fact that it remains the strongest driver of social mobility for young working-class people, personally, this country has had in recent decades. Perhaps the sole mechanism of social mobility, working extensively.

The Importance of Aspiration

Ambition is essential for our country to prosper. For hope to exist, there needs to be a believable feeling that effort and reward are connected; that if people aspire, they can achieve. For political leadership, being able to instil a outlook of positivity about the future is crucial. Analysis by the research body at the academic establishment and others, published last month, showed that the education department’s targeted regions I introduced as education secretary – community-focused methods to boosting academic achievement – led to young people in those areas being up to nearly one-fifth more hopeful about their future than those in comparable communities without these initiatives in place. The evidence is clear: just making an authentic start on equal chance initiatives can rapidly and effectively change how people view their future.

Squandered Chances

Oblivious to this, and in the middle of its post-Johnson leadership contest, in September 2022, the ruling party ended the initiatives. Why should any person in those communities vote for a party that took that action? The targeted programme is one example of what might have become a game-changing Tory policy platform on social mobility, but that chance was completely wasted. Approaches such as this can create belief and drive. Conversely, as the ruling party learned, failing to deliver of equal opportunity is the costliest mistake any government can make. The electorate punished the government for its ineffectiveness but, perhaps most of all, for its broken promises on levelling up.

Present Circumstances

At present the mandate on social mobility and fair access has passed to a new administration. The old slogan has been discarded. The new government has its own policy language of “removing obstacles to success”. The organization that is gradually replacing the hapless incumbents, Reform UK, also has its own message – “economic renewal”. The terminology to talk about additional chances in regions like the one I was raised in, in the region. It suggests that an historical manufacturing base can revive into an industrial future.

For voters, it must seem like a déjà vu experience. Identical problem, new terminology. But – as yet – no results.

Lessons for the Future

Should the current and alternative parties want to avoid the identical outcome, both these parties should learn from the Tories’ mistakes on levelling up; that equal opportunity talk is simple terminology, but actual achievement of fairer outcomes is much harder. Our nation’s chronically poor life chances remains the primary challenge for our country, with the next generation unable to get a good job beginning, those putting in effort in full-time jobs with minimal progress after the living expenses are met, and individuals nationwide without any real hope their next generation will be able to do improve in life than they have.

Elected officials can mention equal chances repeatedly. Yet where is the political group that has the comprehensive policy agenda on social mobility? I observe no such party. Whoever gets there first, wins. Not only for their party, but, more importantly, for a complete society that has never needed equality of opportunity so desperately.