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As the beleaguered Conservative party meets in its conference city for its annual party conference, it has much to ponder regarding its path forward. There is uncertainty if a road forward exists at all. These are difficult days for a governing group that now has almost nothing, if anything, new or unique to say to the public.

What Could Have Been

The situation might have been vastly better if tangible progress had been made on an agenda that matters to people across the country: Equal opportunity. But the former leadership lacked the slightest idea on how to transform his zeitgeisty rhetoric on levelling up into policy reality. For the two years after the 2019 election, it debated what the term actually signified.

It seemed strange to me, because I had previously explained to the Prime Minister what social mobility meant when we first spoke about it during his leadership campaign. This terminology was a term I developed and used at the education ministry to talk about social mobility. It served as our departmental mantra, and its meaning is clear: social mobility is the means by which we attain equal access – not through reducing opportunity away from those who already have it, but rather by providing options to those that lack them.

Fundamental Idea

Another crucial ministry expression we used, “potential is equally shared throughout the nation, yet chances are not”, again was a purposeful phrase, representing the two halves of a fairness agenda. To begin with, potential shared equally but not cultivated evenly through our education system. Second, opportunities not spread evenly by employers or our economic system. Thus, learning and employment were key to achieving stronger social mobility. This represented an agenda about the social fabric of our country – supporting people’s potential and providing access to prospects.

The Reality of Implementation

What did the social mobility agenda become under Johnson’s Conservatives? A towns fund administered out of the DLUHC. Hanging baskets and rearranged intersections. A white paper was published almost thirty-six months after the leadership change, which saw current strategies rebadged under the new levelling up banner.

Consequently, a wider fairness strategy went undeveloped, as well as all the improvement that it might have driven – in investment, enterprise, financial planning, taxation and in place-making. Additionally, in learning, including a university system that has become a punchbag for politicians of all stripes – although it remains the primary vehicle of upward movement for youth from modest backgrounds, including myself, this country has had throughout modern times. Maybe the primary source of equal opportunity, working extensively.

The Role of Ambition

Ambition is vital for our country to succeed. For hope to exist, there needs to be a believable feeling that effort and reward are linked; that if people aspire, they can achieve. For all administrations, being able to foster a sense of optimism about the future is crucial. Research by the academic institution at Bath University and others, recently released, showed that the DfE’s 12 “opportunity areas” I introduced as education secretary – locally targeted strategies to enhancing learning results – led to young people in those areas being up to a significant margin more positive about their future than those in similar areas without these programmes in place. The evidence is clear: just making an genuine beginning on pro-social mobility policy can quickly and positively change how people perceive their destiny.

Squandered Chances

Unaware of these findings, and in the middle of its new leader election, in September 2022, the Tory administration terminated the programmes. Why should any person in those regions vote for a party that did that? This specific initiative is a single instance of what had the potential to be a transformative Conservative government agenda on levelling up, but that chance was totally misused. Strategies such as this can create belief and drive. On the other hand, as the Conservatives discovered, 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 broken promises on social mobility.

Today’s Political Reality

Now the baton on equal opportunity and equal chances has been taken up by a Labour government. The old slogan has been abandoned. The new government has its own political rhetoric of “breaking down the barriers to opportunity”. The political group that is steadily supplanting the hapless incumbents, the challenger, also has its own language – “reindustrialisation”. The terminology to talk about new opportunities in areas like the one I was raised in, in my hometown. It promises that an industrial past can be reborn into an industrial future.

For the public, it must seem like a déjà vu experience. Same issue, different language. Yet, currently, little improvement.

Lessons for the Future

Whether the government and opposition want to escape the same fate, both these parties should understand the previous government’s errors on social mobility; that fair chance language is easy to say, but successful delivery of fairer outcomes is significantly more difficult. Our nation’s persistently low equal opportunity remains the key issue for our country, with the next generation unable to get a decent career start, those putting in effort in full-time jobs with little to show after the living expenses are met, and people across the country without any real hope their offspring will be able to do advance in life than they have.

Leaders can mention fairer opportunities however much they like. However, which party has the political group that has the thorough strategy on life chances? I observe no such party. Whichever party succeeds initially, succeeds. Not only for themselves, but, more importantly, for a complete society that has urgently needs equality of opportunity so badly.