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As the beleaguered Tories gathers in its conference city for its annual party conference, it has plenty to consider regarding its next steps. It’s not even clear if a clear direction exists at all. These are difficult days for a governing group that now has very little, if anything, new or unique to say to the electorate.

The Missed Opportunity

Things could have turned out vastly better if real advances had been made on an priority that is important for people nationwide: Social mobility. Yet the former leadership hadn’t got the first clue on how to turn the popular slogan on social mobility into actual implementation. During the initial period after the general election, it argued over what the phrase truly represented.

It seemed strange to me, because I had previously explained to Johnson what social mobility entailed when we initially discussed about it during the contest for party leader. This terminology was a term I developed and used at the Department for Education to talk about life chances. It was our departmental mantra, and its meaning is straightforward: social mobility is the means by which we attain equal access – not through reducing prospects away from those who are already advantaged, but rather by providing opportunities to those that lack them.

Essential Principle

An additional vital education department term we used, “ability is distributed uniformly across our country, yet chances are not”, represented another a deliberate expression, representing the two parts of a social mobility strategy. To begin with, potential shared equally but not nurtured uniformly through our schools and colleges. Furthermore, chances not distributed fairly by the private sector or our economic system. Therefore, learning and employment were crucial to achieving improved equality of opportunity. This constituted an mission about the societal structure of our country – investing in human talent and providing access to prospects.

What Levelling Up Became

How did the social mobility agenda become under the Tory administration? Local investment schemes overseen from the the relevant ministry. Decorative floral displays and redeveloped traffic systems. An official policy document was published a significant period after Johnson became leader, which saw ongoing initiatives relabelled under the new levelling up banner.

Therefore, a broader social mobility agenda went unpursued, as well as all the change that it might have driven – in investment, commerce, fiscal strategy, tax and in place-making. And, of course, in schooling, including a university system that has become a scapegoat for leaders across parties – even though it remains the strongest driver of upward movement for youth from modest backgrounds, including myself, this country has had over the past 30 years. Possibly the only engine of social mobility, functioning widely.

Why Hope Matters

Hope is vital for our country to succeed. For people to have aspiration, there needs to be a credible sense that hard work and results are related; that if people dream big, they can attain. For any government, being able to create a feeling of hope about the tomorrow is crucial. Analysis by the research body at Bath University and others, published last month, showed that the DfE’s 12 “opportunity areas” I introduced as education secretary – community-focused methods to boosting academic achievement – led to students in those communities being up to nearly one-fifth more hopeful about their life ahead than those in similar areas without these initiatives in place. The research confirms: just making an genuine beginning on fair opportunity strategies can rapidly and effectively change how people perceive their future.

Missed Opportunities

Ignoring this evidence, and in the throes of its new leader election, in autumn 2022, the ruling party terminated the programmes. What reason would someone in those regions vote for a organization that took that action? This specific initiative is a single instance of what could have been a transformative Tory policy platform on social mobility, but that possibility was hopelessly squandered. Strategies such as this can inspire hope and aspiration. Conversely, as the Tories learned, reneging on commitments of social mobility is the costliest mistake any government can make. Voters punished the leadership for its failure but, primarily, for its broken promises on levelling up.

Today’s Political Reality

At present the baton on life chances and equal chances has passed to a Labour government. The old slogan has been discarded. The new government has its own policy language of “removing obstacles to success”. The political group that is increasingly displacing the hapless incumbents, Reform UK, also has its own language – “industrial revival”. The terminology to talk about fresh prospects in regions like the one I was raised in, in South Yorkshire. It claims that an industrial past can be reborn into an revitalized economy.

For the public, it must appear as a déjà vu experience. Identical problem, alternative phrasing. But – as yet – no results.

What Must Change

Should the current and alternative parties want to prevent the similar destiny, both these parties should understand the Conservatives’ failure on levelling up; that fair chance language is easy to say, but successful delivery of more equal results is significantly more difficult. Our nation’s endemically weak life chances remains the primary challenge for our country, with the next generation unable to get a good job beginning, those laboring in occupations with few results after the housing costs are covered, and people across the country without any genuine belief their children will be able to do any better in life than they have.

Leaders can discuss improved access repeatedly. But where is the party that has the thorough strategy on social mobility? None appear to exist. Whichever party succeeds initially, succeeds. Not just for themselves, but, more importantly, for a entire nation that has never needed fair chances so desperately.