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As the struggling Conservative party meets in its conference city for its yearly gathering, it has plenty to consider regarding its path forward. There is uncertainty if a road forward is available. These are tough times for a governing group that now has little, if anything, fresh or distinctive to say to voters.

The Missed Opportunity

Things could have turned out so different if tangible progress had been made on an agenda that resonates with people across the country: Equal opportunity. But the previous administration did not possess the basic understanding on how to convert the trendy talk on social mobility into concrete action. Over twenty-four months after the general election, it debated what the concept even meant.

I was perplexed, because I had clearly defined for the Prime Minister what social mobility signified when we first spoke about it during his leadership campaign. The expression was language I created and used at the Department for Education to talk about social mobility. It served as our departmental mantra, and its meaning is straightforward: social mobility is the approach by which we attain equality of opportunity – not by taking opportunity away from those who are already advantaged, but rather by expanding options to those that are without.

The Core Concept

Another crucial education department term we used, “talent is spread evenly throughout the nation, however access isn’t”, served as a deliberate expression, reflecting the two halves of a equal opportunity plan. First, potential shared equally but not cultivated evenly through our learning institutions. Second, chances not distributed fairly by the private sector or our economic system. Therefore, learning and employment were crucial to achieving stronger social mobility. This constituted an priority about the social fabric of our country – investing in individual capabilities and providing access to prospects.

What Levelling Up Became

How did levelling up become under the Tory administration? Regional development money overseen from the DLUHC. Decorative floral displays and rearranged intersections. A government strategy was launched nearly three years after Johnson became leader, which saw existing policy approaches repackaged under the recently branded agenda.

Consequently, a wider fairness strategy went undeveloped, as well as all the reform that it may have generated – in investment, commerce, fiscal strategy, taxation and in place-making. Moreover, in education, including a higher education sector that has become a target for leaders across parties – although it remains the primary vehicle of social mobility for youth from modest backgrounds, including myself, this country has had in recent decades. Perhaps the only engine of social mobility, working extensively.

The Importance of Aspiration

Aspiration is vital for our country to prosper. To foster ambition, there needs to be a believable feeling that hard work and results are related; that if people dream big, they can achieve. For political leadership, being able to create a outlook of positivity about the years ahead is crucial. Analysis by the academic institution at Bath University and others, newly available, showed that the DfE’s 12 “opportunity areas” I launched while in office – locally targeted strategies to improving education outcomes – led to young people in those areas being up to a significant margin more hopeful about their prospects than those in similar areas without these schemes in place. The data shows: just making an authentic start on fair opportunity strategies can quickly and positively change how people view their future.

Missed Opportunities

Oblivious to this, and in the midst of its new leader election, in September 2022, the Tory administration terminated the programmes. Why would anyone in those regions vote for a political group that did that? This specific initiative is a clear case of what might have become a transformative administration strategy on levelling up, but that opportunity was totally misused. Strategies such as this can inspire hope and aspiration. Conversely, as the Conservatives learned, breaking the promise of social mobility is the most expensive error any government can make. The electorate punished the leadership for its failure but, above all, for its broken promises on levelling up.

Today’s Political Reality

Currently the baton on equal opportunity and equality of opportunity has been transferred to a Labour government. The old slogan has been discarded. Labour has its own political rhetoric of “breaking down the barriers to opportunity”. The party that is increasingly displacing the hapless incumbents, the challenger, also has its own terminology – “industrial revival”. It’s a phrase to talk about new opportunities in areas like the one I was raised in, in the region. It claims that an historical manufacturing base can revive into an industrial future.

For the public, it must appear as a déjà vu experience. Identical problem, different language. However, so far, no progress.

The Way Forward

Should the current and alternative parties want to escape the similar destiny, each group should understand the Tories’ mistakes on levelling up; that equal opportunity talk is easy to say, but actual achievement of more equal results is far more challenging. The UK’s endemically weak social mobility remains the primary challenge for our country, with young people 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 individuals nationwide without any actual expectation their offspring will be able to do any better in life than they have.

Politicians can discuss equal chances as much as they want. However, which party has the political group that has the comprehensive policy agenda on life chances? I observe no such party. Whoever gets there first, wins. Not just for their party, but, crucially, for a complete society that has never needed equality of opportunity so badly.