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As the existentially challenged Tories convenes in its conference city for its yearly gathering, it has plenty to consider regarding its future direction. It’s not even clear if a clear direction exists at all. These are tough times for a governing group that now has almost nothing, if anything, new or unique to say to voters.

What Could Have Been

The situation might have been vastly better if concrete steps had been made on an policy focus that matters to people across the country: Social mobility. But the former leadership lacked the slightest idea on how to turn the popular slogan on levelling up into actual implementation. For the two years after the 2019 election, it debated what the phrase even meant.

It seemed strange to me, because I had previously explained to the Prime Minister what social mobility entailed when we first spoke about it during the contest for party leader. The phrase was a term I developed and used at the DfE to talk about life chances. It served as our guiding principle, and its purpose is straightforward: social mobility is the means by which we realize equality of opportunity – not through reducing opportunity away from those who possess it, but rather by providing chances to those that lack them.

Essential Principle

Another crucial education department term we used, “talent is spread evenly around the UK, but opportunity is not”, again was a purposeful phrase, reflecting the dual components of a equal opportunity plan. To begin with, potential shared equally but not developed consistently through our learning institutions. Second, chances not distributed fairly by the private sector or our economic system. As a result, education and business were key to achieving improved equality of opportunity. This was an mission about the societal structure of our country – fostering individual capabilities and connecting them to prospects.

The Actual Outcome

How did levelling up turn into under Johnson’s Conservatives? Local investment schemes overseen from the the relevant ministry. Decorative floral displays and rearranged intersections. An official policy document was launched almost thirty-six months after Johnson became leader, which saw existing policy approaches relabelled under the new levelling up banner.

Consequently, a broader social mobility agenda went ignored, as well as all the change that it may have generated – in funding, commerce, economic policy, revenue and in local regeneration. Additionally, in learning, including a university system that has become a target for politicians of all stripes – even though it remains the strongest driver of social mobility for youth from modest backgrounds, including myself, this country has had over the past 30 years. Maybe the only engine of fair chances, functioning widely.

Why Hope Matters

Ambition is crucial for our country to thrive. To foster ambition, there needs to be a believable feeling that hard work and results are related; that if people dream big, they can succeed. For any government, being able to create a feeling of hope about the years ahead is critical. Studies by the research body at Bath University and others, recently released, showed that the DfE’s 12 “opportunity areas” I introduced as education secretary – place-based approaches to boosting academic achievement – led to youth in those communities being up to a significant margin more hopeful about their life ahead than those in comparable communities without these programmes in place. The evidence is clear: just making an genuine beginning on fair opportunity strategies can swiftly and beneficially 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 Tory administration closed opportunity areas down. Why would anyone in those regions vote for a party that did that? This specific initiative is a clear case of what had the potential to be a revolutionary Conservative government agenda on levelling up, but that possibility was completely wasted. Methods such as this can generate optimism and ambition. In contrast, as the Conservatives found out, breaking the promise of equal opportunity is the most expensive error any leadership can make. Voters penalized the leadership for its failure but, perhaps most of all, for its broken promises on levelling up.

The Current Landscape

Now the responsibility on life chances and equality of opportunity has been taken up by a opposition party. The old slogan has been discarded. The current administration has its own political rhetoric of “breaking down the barriers to opportunity”. The political group that is steadily supplanting the failing Tories, Reform UK, also has its own message – “reindustrialisation”. This expression to talk about additional chances in areas like the one I was raised in, in my hometown. It promises that an former economic strength can revive into an modern manufacturing sector.

For voters, it must feel like a repetitive cycle. Similar challenge, alternative phrasing. Yet, currently, little improvement.

The Way Forward

Whether the government and opposition want to escape the same fate, both these parties should understand the Tories’ mistakes on levelling up; that social mobility rhetoric is easy to say, but successful delivery of more equal results is far more challenging. The UK’s persistently low social mobility remains the central problem for our country, with young people unable to get a good job beginning, those laboring in employment with minimal progress after the living expenses are met, and people across the country without any real hope their offspring will be able to do any better in life than they have.

Leaders can talk about improved access as much as they want. But where is the party that has the comprehensive policy agenda on equal opportunity? None appear to exist. Whoever gets there first, succeeds. Not just for their party, but, significantly, for a whole country that has urgently needs fair chances so urgently.