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While the existentially challenged Conservative party gathers in Manchester for its annual party conference, it has much to ponder regarding its next steps. Doubt remains if a road forward remains open. These are challenging circumstances for a political party that now has little, if anything, new or unique to say to the electorate.

The Missed Opportunity

The situation might have been vastly better if tangible progress had been made on an policy focus that is important for people throughout the UK: Equal opportunity. Yet Boris Johnson’s government lacked the slightest idea on how to transform his zeitgeisty rhetoric on levelling up into policy reality. During the initial period after the 2019 election, it discussed what the term even meant.

I was perplexed, because I had clearly defined for the Prime Minister what social mobility meant when we initially discussed about it during his leadership campaign. The expression was a term I developed and used at the Department for Education to talk about life chances. This became our guiding principle, and its definition is unambiguous: social mobility is the means by which we realize equal access – not by taking chances away from those who already have it, but rather by providing options to those that lack them.

The Core Concept

Another crucial ministry expression we used, “talent is spread evenly around the UK, yet chances are not”, served as a deliberate expression, reflecting the dual components of a social mobility strategy. First, potential shared equally but not cultivated evenly through our schools and colleges. Additionally, chances not distributed fairly by employers or our economic system. Therefore, learning and employment were key to achieving improved equality of opportunity. This was an mission about the social fabric of our country – supporting human talent and linking them with opportunities.

The Actual Outcome

How did the social mobility agenda turn into under the Tory administration? A towns fund overseen from the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities. Decorative floral displays and reconfigured roundabouts and roads. A government strategy was launched nearly three years after Johnson became leader, which saw existing policy approaches rebadged under the new levelling up banner.

Therefore, a comprehensive equal opportunity plan went unpursued, as well as all the improvement that it could have inspired – in funding, enterprise, fiscal strategy, tax and in local regeneration. And, of course, in education, including a higher education sector that has become a target for leaders across parties – although it remains the strongest driver of upward movement for youth from modest backgrounds, including myself, this country has had throughout modern times. Perhaps the only engine of social mobility, functioning widely.

Why Hope Matters

Aspiration is vital for our country to thrive. For people to have aspiration, there needs to be a believable feeling that dedication and outcome are connected; that if people aim high, they can attain. For all administrations, being able to instil a sense of optimism about the years ahead is crucial. Research by the Institute for Policy Research at the university and others, published last month, showed that the DfE’s 12 “opportunity areas” I introduced as education secretary – place-based approaches to improving education outcomes – led to students in those communities being up to a significant margin more positive about their life ahead than those in similar areas without these schemes in place. The research confirms: just making an sincere effort on equal chance initiatives can quickly and positively change how people feel about their future.

Squandered Chances

Unaware of these findings, and in the throes of its successor selection process, in September 2022, the Conservative government closed opportunity areas down. Why would anyone in those communities vote for a political group that made that decision? This specific initiative is a clear case of what could have been a game-changing Conservative government agenda on social mobility, but that possibility was completely wasted. Methods such as this can inspire hope and aspiration. Conversely, as the Conservatives learned, breaking the promise of equal opportunity is the most expensive error any political party can make. The public held accountable the administration for its ineffectiveness but, perhaps most of all, for its failed pledges on equal opportunity.

Present Circumstances

Now the baton on life chances and equality of opportunity has been transferred to a new administration. The old slogan has been abandoned. The current administration has its own public messaging of “breaking down the barriers to opportunity”. The organization that is increasingly displacing the hapless Conservative party, the alternative party, also has its own terminology – “industrial revival”. This expression to talk about additional chances in communities like the one I was raised in, in South Yorkshire. It promises that an industrial past can reincarnate into an revitalized economy.

To the electorate, it must feel like a déjà vu experience. Identical problem, different language. But – as yet – no results.

What Must Change

If Labour and Reform UK want to avoid the same fate, both these parties should take lessons from the previous government’s errors on levelling up; that social mobility rhetoric is easy to say, but actual achievement of more equal results is far more challenging. The UK’s chronically poor equal opportunity remains the key issue for our country, with youth unable to get a decent career start, those putting in effort in employment with minimal progress after the housing costs are covered, and citizens throughout the UK without any genuine belief their children will be able to do any better in life than they have.

Elected officials can discuss improved access as much as they want. However, which party has the organization that has the thorough strategy on social mobility? I observe no such party. The first to achieve this, succeeds. Not only for their organization, but, more importantly, for a whole country that has never needed equality of opportunity so badly.