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As the existentially challenged Conservative party gathers in Manchester for its annual party conference, it has a lot to reflect on regarding its path forward. There is uncertainty if a clear direction remains open. These are tough times for a political party that now has very little, if anything, new or unique to say to voters.

An Alternate Reality

Things could have turned out so different if tangible progress had been made on an policy focus that is important for people nationwide: Levelling up. Yet the previous administration hadn’t got the first clue on how to convert the trendy talk on social mobility into actual implementation. During the initial period after the 2019 election, it debated what the concept truly represented.

I was perplexed, because I had previously explained to the Prime Minister what social mobility signified when we initially discussed about it during the contest for party leader. This terminology was language I created and used at the Department for Education to talk about social mobility. It served as our guiding principle, and its meaning is clear: social mobility is the means by which we attain equality of opportunity – not through reducing prospects away from those who are already advantaged, but rather by extending options to those that don’t.

Fundamental Idea

An additional vital ministry expression we used, “ability is distributed uniformly across our country, yet chances are not”, served as a intentional wording, representing the two parts of a social mobility strategy. To begin with, potential shared equally but not developed consistently through our schools and colleges. Furthermore, chances not distributed fairly by employers or our economy. Therefore, education and business were crucial to achieving stronger social mobility. This was an agenda about the social fabric of our country – fostering individual capabilities and providing access to chances.

What Levelling Up Became

What did levelling up become under Johnson’s Conservatives? A towns fund overseen from the the relevant ministry. Hanging baskets and reconfigured roundabouts and roads. An official policy document was published nearly three years after the Prime Minister took office, which saw ongoing initiatives relabelled under the new levelling up banner.

Therefore, a wider fairness strategy went unpursued, as well as all the improvement that it may have generated – in funding, business, financial planning, tax and in local regeneration. Additionally, in schooling, including a university system that has become a target for politicians of all stripes – although it remains the most powerful engine of social mobility for young working-class people, personally, this country has had in recent decades. Perhaps the primary source of equal opportunity, working extensively.

Why Hope Matters

Aspiration is essential for our country to succeed. For hope to exist, there needs to be a credible sense that dedication and outcome are related; that if people aspire, they can attain. For any government, being able to instil a outlook of positivity about the future is important. Analysis by the research body at Bath University and others, published last month, showed that the ministry’s focus zones I launched while in office – community-focused methods to enhancing learning results – led to young people in those communities being up to 18 percentage points more hopeful about their prospects than those in comparable communities without these schemes in place. The research confirms: just making an sincere effort on fair opportunity strategies can rapidly and effectively change how people feel about their destiny.

Squandered Chances

Ignoring this evidence, and in the middle of its post-Johnson leadership contest, in September 2022, the Tory administration ended the initiatives. What reason would someone in those regions vote for a organization that took that action? The opportunity areas policy is a clear case of what had the potential to be a game-changing Conservative government agenda on levelling up, but that chance was totally misused. Approaches such as this can inspire hope and aspiration. On the other hand, as the Conservatives discovered, failing to deliver of social mobility is the costliest mistake any political party can make. The electorate punished the leadership for its ineffectiveness but, perhaps most of all, for its broken promises on social mobility.

Present Circumstances

Currently the responsibility on life chances and equal chances has been taken up by a opposition party. The previous terminology has been discarded. The current administration has its own policy language of “removing obstacles to success”. The political group that is increasingly displacing the struggling Tories, Reform UK, also has its own terminology – “reindustrialisation”. It’s a phrase to talk about fresh prospects in areas like the one I grew up in, in my hometown. It suggests that an former economic strength can reincarnate into an industrial future.

For voters, it must seem like a déjà vu experience. Similar challenge, new terminology. Yet, currently, little improvement.

The Way Forward

Should the current and alternative parties want to prevent the same fate, both these parties should take lessons from the previous government’s errors on levelling up; that social mobility rhetoric is one thing, but effective implementation of fairer outcomes 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 proper professional launch, those laboring in occupations with little to show after the housing costs are covered, and people across the country without any real hope their children will be able to do any better in life than they have.

Politicians can discuss fairer opportunities however much they like. However, which party has the organization that has the comprehensive policy agenda on life chances? None appear to exist. Whoever gets there first, succeeds. Not just for their party, but, significantly, for a whole country that has never needed fair chances so urgently.