I advocated for levelling up as the key to Tory electoral victory – but the former Prime Minister didn’t do it. Observe the consequences.

As the existentially challenged Conservative party convenes in its conference city for its annual party conference, it has much to ponder regarding its path forward. Doubt remains if a clear direction remains open. We are in challenging circumstances for a political party that now has little, if anything, fresh or distinctive to say to the electorate.

The Missed Opportunity

It could have been vastly better if concrete steps had been made on an policy focus that matters to people nationwide: Levelling up. Yet the previous administration did not possess the slightest idea on how to convert the trendy talk on social mobility into concrete action. Over twenty-four months after the general election, it discussed what the term actually signified.

I was perplexed, because I had clearly defined for Johnson what levelling up entailed when we originally talked about it during his leadership campaign. The phrase was a concept I originated and used at the Department for Education to talk about social mobility. This became our guiding principle, and its definition is straightforward: levelling up is the method by which we realize fair chances – not by taking prospects away from those who already have it, but rather by extending chances to those that don’t.

The Core Concept

An additional vital ministry expression we used, “potential is equally shared throughout the nation, but opportunity is not”, again was a purposeful phrase, representing the two parts of a fairness agenda. To begin with, potential shared equally but not nurtured uniformly through our learning institutions. Additionally, opportunities not spread evenly by employers or our economic system. Thus, education and business were crucial to achieving better life chances. This was an agenda about the societal structure of our country – investing in people’s potential and linking them with opportunities.

What Levelling Up Became

What did the social mobility agenda evolve into under Johnson’s Conservatives? Local investment schemes administered out of the DLUHC. Street beautification and reconfigured roundabouts and roads. A white paper was released a significant period after Johnson became leader, which saw ongoing initiatives rebadged under the new levelling up banner.

Therefore, a wider fairness strategy went ignored, as well as all the change that it might have driven – in capital, enterprise, fiscal strategy, revenue and in place-making. And, of course, in learning, including a university system that has become a punchbag for elected officials – although it remains the strongest driver of social mobility for individuals from less privileged homes, including myself, this country has had over the past 30 years. Possibly the sole mechanism of equal opportunity, operating at scale.

Why Hope Matters

Ambition is vital for our country to thrive. For hope to exist, there needs to be a credible sense that effort and reward are connected; that if people aim high, they can attain. For all administrations, being able to instil a feeling of hope about the tomorrow is critical. Studies by the academic institution at the university and others, recently released, showed that the ministry’s focus zones I launched while in office – locally targeted strategies to boosting academic achievement – led to students in those communities being up to a significant margin more optimistic about their life ahead than those in equivalent locations without these schemes in place. The research confirms: just making an sincere effort on fair opportunity strategies can quickly and positively change how people feel about their prospects.

Squandered Chances

Oblivious to this, and in the middle of its post-Johnson leadership contest, in September 2022, the ruling party closed opportunity areas down. Why should any person in those regions vote for a organization that took that action? The opportunity areas policy is a single instance of what could have been a game-changing Tory policy platform on social mobility, but that chance was totally misused. Methods such as this can inspire hope and aspiration. On the other hand, as the Conservatives discovered, failing to deliver of social mobility is the biggest blunder any political party can make. The public penalized the leadership for its failure but, above all, for its unfulfilled commitments on levelling up.

Today’s Political Reality

At present the baton on social mobility and fair access has passed to a Labour government. The old slogan has been abandoned. Labour has its own political rhetoric of “removing obstacles to success”. The organization that is steadily supplanting the failing Conservative party, Reform UK, also has its own language – “reindustrialisation”. The terminology to talk about new opportunities in regions like the one I come from, in my hometown. It promises that an historical manufacturing base can reincarnate into an industrial future.

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

The Way Forward

Should the current and alternative parties want to avoid the identical outcome, each group should learn from the Conservatives’ failure on social mobility; that fair chance language is simple terminology, but actual achievement of fairer outcomes is far more challenging. Our nation’s persistently low life chances remains the primary challenge for our country, with young people unable to get a good job beginning, those working hard in occupations 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 advance in life than they have.

Elected officials can discuss improved access as much as they want. But where is the organization that has the thorough strategy on social mobility? None appear to exist. The first to achieve this, prevails. Not just for their organization, but, more importantly, for a entire nation that has desperately requires equality of opportunity so desperately.