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While the existentially challenged Tories convenes in its conference city for its yearly gathering, it has much to ponder regarding its next steps. Doubt remains if a clear direction is available. These are difficult days for a governing group that now has almost nothing, if anything, new or unique to say to voters.

An Alternate Reality

Things could have turned out vastly better if real advances had been made on an policy focus that is important for people nationwide: Social mobility. But the previous administration lacked the basic understanding on how to turn the trendy talk on social mobility into policy reality. During the initial period after the general election, it argued over what the concept actually signified.

It seemed strange to me, because I’d already told the Prime Minister what social mobility entailed when we originally talked about it during his leadership campaign. The phrase was a concept I originated and used at the education ministry to talk about equal opportunity. It was our guiding principle, and its definition is straightforward: social mobility is the method by which we realize equal access – without removing opportunity away from those who are already advantaged, but rather by extending options to those that are without.

Fundamental Idea

Another crucial DfE phrase we used, “talent is spread evenly around the UK, yet chances are not”, represented another a purposeful phrase, reflecting the two parts of a fairness agenda. To begin with, talent spread evenly but not nurtured uniformly through our schools and colleges. Additionally, access not provided uniformly by businesses or our economic system. As a result, learning and employment were key to achieving stronger social mobility. This represented an mission about the societal structure of our country – fostering human talent and connecting them to opportunities.

The Actual Outcome

What did levelling up evolve into under Johnson’s Conservatives? Regional development money managed by the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities. Hanging baskets and redeveloped traffic systems. A government strategy was published a significant period after Johnson became leader, which saw current strategies rebadged under the fresh social mobility slogan.

As a result, a wider fairness strategy went unpursued, as well as all the change that it might have driven – in capital, commerce, financial planning, taxation and in community development. And, of course, in schooling, including a higher education sector that has become a target for elected officials – despite the fact that it remains the primary vehicle of life improvement for youth from modest backgrounds, including myself, this country has had throughout modern times. Maybe the sole mechanism of social mobility, operating at scale.

The Importance of Aspiration

Ambition is vital for our country to thrive. For people to have aspiration, there needs to be a credible sense that effort and reward are connected; that if people dream big, they can attain. For all administrations, being able to foster a sense of optimism about the years ahead is important. Research 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 – place-based approaches to boosting academic achievement – led to students in those areas being up to nearly one-fifth more optimistic about their life ahead than those in comparable communities without these initiatives in place. The research confirms: just making an genuine beginning on equal chance initiatives can quickly and positively change how people perceive their future.

Lost Potential

Ignoring this evidence, and in the middle of its new leader election, in that period, the Conservative government closed opportunity areas down. Why should any person in those communities vote for a organization that did that? The targeted programme is a single instance of what had the potential to be a transformative Conservative government agenda on levelling up, but that possibility was totally misused. Approaches such as this can create belief and drive. In contrast, as the Conservatives learned, reneging on commitments of social mobility is the most expensive error any leadership can make. Voters punished the leadership for its incompetence but, above all, for its unfulfilled commitments on social mobility.

Today’s Political Reality

At present the mandate on social mobility and equal chances has been taken up by a opposition party. The levelling up rhetoric has been abandoned. Labour has its own public messaging of “eliminating hurdles to advancement”. The organization that is gradually replacing the failing Tories, the alternative party, also has its own language – “industrial revival”. It’s a phrase to talk about new opportunities in regions like the one I grew up in, in my hometown. It claims that an former economic strength can be reborn into an modern manufacturing sector.

For the public, it must seem like a Groundhog Day-style loop. Same issue, new terminology. However, so far, no progress.

The Way Forward

If Labour and Reform UK want to avoid the same fate, each group should learn from the Conservatives’ failure on levelling up; that social mobility rhetoric is one thing, but successful delivery of improved opportunities is much harder. Our nation’s chronically poor social mobility remains the key issue for our country, with youth unable to get a decent career start, those laboring in occupations with little to show after the rent has been paid, and people across the country without any real hope their children will be able to do improve in life than they have.

Elected officials can talk about equal chances as much as they want. Yet where is the party that has the complete plan on social mobility? None appear to exist. Whoever gets there first, prevails. Not just for themselves, but, significantly, for a complete society that has desperately requires equal access so urgently.