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While the struggling Conservative party meets in Manchester for its annual party conference, it has plenty to consider regarding its future direction. It’s not even clear if a clear direction remains open. These are difficult days for a political party that now has little, if anything, fresh or distinctive to say to the electorate.

An Alternate Reality

It could have been vastly better if tangible progress had been made on an policy focus that is important for people throughout the UK: Social mobility. Yet the previous administration lacked the first clue on how to transform his zeitgeisty rhetoric on social mobility into policy reality. For the two years after the 2019 election, it discussed what the concept truly represented.

It seemed strange to me, because I had previously explained to the Prime Minister what social mobility entailed when we originally talked about it during his leadership campaign. This terminology was a term I developed and used at the DfE to talk about life chances. This became our guiding principle, and its definition is clear: levelling up is the means by which we realize equality of opportunity – not by taking opportunity away from those who possess it, but rather by expanding options to those that don’t.

Fundamental Idea

The other key education department term we used, “potential is equally shared across our country, however access isn’t”, served as a intentional wording, embodying the dual components of a equal opportunity plan. First, potential shared equally but not nurtured uniformly through our education system. Additionally, chances not distributed fairly by employers or our market. Therefore, education and business were crucial to achieving stronger social mobility. This was an agenda about the community framework of our country – supporting human talent and connecting them to prospects.

The Reality of Implementation

How did levelling up become under the previous government? Regional development money administered out of the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities. Hanging baskets and rearranged intersections. A white paper was launched almost thirty-six months after the Prime Minister took office, which saw ongoing initiatives repackaged under the fresh social mobility slogan.

Consequently, a comprehensive equal opportunity plan went unpursued, as well as all the improvement that it may have generated – in investment, commerce, fiscal strategy, taxation and in community development. Additionally, in schooling, including a higher education sector that has become a punchbag for politicians of all stripes – even though it remains the primary vehicle of life improvement for individuals from less privileged homes, including myself, this country has had over the past 30 years. Perhaps the sole mechanism of fair chances, operating at scale.

Why Hope Matters

Aspiration is crucial for our country to prosper. For hope to exist, there needs to be a believable feeling that hard work and results are connected; that if people aim high, they can succeed. For all administrations, being able to create a sense of optimism about the future is important. Studies by the academic institution at the academic establishment and others, recently released, showed that the ministry’s focus zones I launched while in office – place-based approaches to improving education outcomes – led to young people in those neighborhoods being up to a significant margin more hopeful about their prospects than those in similar areas without these schemes in place. The research confirms: just making an sincere effort on equal chance initiatives can rapidly and effectively change how people view their prospects.

Lost Potential

Oblivious to this, and in the midst of its post-Johnson leadership contest, in that period, the ruling party terminated the programmes. Why should any person in those communities vote for a organization that took that action? This specific initiative is one example of what could have been a revolutionary administration strategy on social mobility, but that possibility was completely wasted. Strategies such as this can generate optimism and ambition. On the other hand, as the ruling party learned, breaking the promise of fair chances is the biggest blunder any leadership can make. The electorate held accountable the leadership for its ineffectiveness but, above all, for its failed pledges on equal opportunity.

Today’s Political Reality

Now the mandate on social mobility and fair access has passed to a opposition party. The levelling up rhetoric has been discarded. The new government has its own policy language of “removing obstacles to success”. The political group that is gradually replacing the struggling Conservative party, the challenger, also has its own terminology – “reindustrialisation”. It’s a phrase to talk about additional chances in areas like the one I grew up in, in the region. It suggests that an former economic strength can be reborn into an industrial future.

To the electorate, it must appear as a déjà vu experience. Same issue, alternative phrasing. However, so far, no progress.

Lessons for the Future

If Labour and Reform UK want to prevent the identical outcome, both these parties should understand the previous government’s errors on levelling up; that equal opportunity talk is easy to say, but successful delivery of fairer outcomes is much harder. Our nation’s endemically weak social mobility remains the central problem for our country, with the next generation unable to get a proper professional launch, those laboring in full-time jobs with few results after the living expenses are met, and people across the country without any genuine belief their next generation will be able to do any better in life than they have.

Leaders can discuss equal chances however much they like. Yet where is the political group that has the comprehensive policy agenda on social mobility? I see none. Whoever gets there first, wins. Not only for themselves, but, crucially, for a whole country that has urgently needs fair chances so urgently.