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As the existentially challenged Conservative party gathers in its conference city for its annual party conference, it has a lot to reflect on regarding its next steps. Doubt remains if a clear direction exists at all. We are in difficult days for a governing group that now has very little, if anything, new or unique to say to voters.

An Alternate Reality

The situation might have been so different if real advances had been made on an policy focus that is important for people across the country: Equal opportunity. However Boris Johnson’s government hadn’t got the basic understanding on how to turn the popular slogan on levelling up into policy reality. During the initial period after the general election, it debated what the phrase actually signified.

I found it bizarre, because I had clearly defined for the Prime Minister what social mobility signified when we first spoke about it during the contest for party leader. The expression was language I created and used at the education ministry to talk about life chances. This became our guiding principle, and its definition is unambiguous: social mobility is the means by which we achieve equal access – not through reducing chances away from those who possess it, but rather by expanding opportunities to those that don’t.

The Core Concept

An additional vital education department term we used, “potential is equally shared around the UK, but opportunity is not”, again was a purposeful phrase, embodying the two parts of a fairness agenda. First, ability distributed uniformly but not cultivated evenly through our schools and colleges. Second, chances not distributed fairly by businesses or our economy. Thus, schools and companies were essential to achieving better life chances. This constituted an agenda about the societal structure of our country – supporting human talent and linking them with opportunities.

The Reality of Implementation

What did levelling up become under the Tory administration? Local investment schemes overseen from the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities. Street beautification and redeveloped traffic systems. An official policy document was launched a significant period after Johnson became leader, which saw current strategies rebadged under the recently branded agenda.

As a result, a broader social mobility agenda went ignored, as well as all the improvement that it might have driven – in funding, enterprise, fiscal strategy, revenue and in local regeneration. Moreover, in learning, including a university system that has become a punchbag for politicians of all stripes – even though it remains the strongest driver of upward movement for young working-class people, personally, this country has had over the past 30 years. Perhaps the primary source of social mobility, functioning widely.

The Role of Ambition

Hope is vital for our country to succeed. For people to have aspiration, there needs to be a believable feeling that dedication and outcome are connected; that if people aspire, they can attain. For any government, being able to instil a sense of optimism about the tomorrow is crucial. Analysis by the academic institution at the academic establishment and others, published last month, showed that the DfE’s 12 “opportunity areas” I introduced as education secretary – place-based approaches to enhancing learning results – led to youth in those areas being up to a significant margin more positive about their future than those in similar areas without these initiatives in place. The data shows: just making an sincere effort on fair opportunity strategies can swiftly and beneficially change how people perceive their prospects.

Squandered Chances

Unaware of these findings, and in the middle of its new leader election, in autumn 2022, the Tory administration closed opportunity areas down. Why should any person in those communities vote for a party that took that action? The targeted programme is a single instance of what might have become a game-changing Conservative government agenda on levelling up, but that chance was totally misused. Approaches such as this can inspire hope and aspiration. On the other hand, as the ruling party learned, breaking the promise of fair chances is the biggest blunder any leadership can make. The public held accountable the leadership for its incompetence but, perhaps most of all, for its failed pledges on equal opportunity.

Today’s Political Reality

Currently the baton on life chances and equal chances has been taken up by a Labour government. The previous terminology has been cast off. Labour has its own policy language of “breaking down the barriers to opportunity”. The party that is increasingly displacing the struggling Tories, Reform UK, also has its own terminology – “reindustrialisation”. This expression to talk about additional chances in areas like the one I come from, in the region. It suggests that an former economic strength can revive into an industrial future.

For voters, it must seem like a repetitive cycle. Same issue, alternative phrasing. But – as yet – no results.

Lessons for the Future

Should the current and alternative parties want to avoid the identical outcome, each group should understand the previous government’s errors on levelling up; that fair chance language is easy to say, but actual achievement of fairer outcomes is significantly more difficult. Our nation’s persistently low social mobility remains the central problem for our country, with the next generation unable to get a decent career start, those laboring in employment with little to show after the living expenses are met, and people across the country without any real hope their children will be able to do improve in life than they have.

Politicians can talk about improved access as much as they want. Yet where is the political group that has the comprehensive policy agenda on social mobility? I observe no such party. The first to achieve this, prevails. Not just for themselves, but, more importantly, for a whole country that has never needed equality of opportunity so urgently.