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While the struggling Conservative party meets in Manchester for its annual party conference, it has plenty to consider regarding its path forward. Doubt remains if a viable path is available. We are in challenging circumstances for a political party that now has very little, if anything, fresh or distinctive to say to the electorate.

The Missed Opportunity

Things could have turned out markedly improved if real advances had been made on an policy focus that matters to people across the country: Levelling up. However the former leadership lacked the basic understanding on how to turn the trendy talk on social mobility into concrete action. During the initial period after the general election, it discussed what the phrase actually signified.

I was perplexed, because I had previously explained to the Prime Minister what social mobility meant when we initially discussed about it during the contest for party leader. The expression was a term I developed and used at the DfE to talk about equal opportunity. It served as our departmental mantra, and its purpose is straightforward: levelling up is the method by which we attain fair chances – not through reducing prospects away from those who are already advantaged, but rather by expanding chances to those that lack them.

The Core Concept

The other key education department term we used, “potential is equally shared across our country, however access isn’t”, represented another a intentional wording, embodying the two parts of a equal opportunity plan. Initially, talent spread evenly but not developed consistently through our education system. Additionally, opportunities not spread evenly by employers or our economy. As a result, schools and companies were essential to achieving improved equality of opportunity. This constituted an priority about the community framework of our country – supporting individual capabilities and linking them with prospects.

The Actual Outcome

How did the social mobility agenda become under the previous government? A towns fund managed by the DLUHC. Hanging baskets and rearranged intersections. A white paper was released almost thirty-six months after the leadership change, which saw current strategies rebadged under the new levelling up banner.

Consequently, a wider fairness strategy went ignored, as well as all the improvement that it could have inspired – in investment, business, fiscal strategy, revenue and in place-making. Additionally, in education, including a university system that has become a target for politicians of all stripes – despite the fact that it remains the primary vehicle of social mobility for youth from modest backgrounds, including myself, this country has had throughout modern times. Maybe the only engine of equal opportunity, operating at scale.

The Role of Ambition

Hope is vital for our country to thrive. To foster ambition, there needs to be a believable feeling that effort and reward are related; that if people aim high, they can succeed. For any government, being able to instil a feeling of hope about the tomorrow is critical. Analysis by the research body at the university and others, published last month, showed that the DfE’s 12 “opportunity areas” I launched while in office – place-based approaches to improving education outcomes – led to youth in those areas being up to 18 percentage points more hopeful about their future than those in comparable communities without these schemes in place. The research confirms: just making an authentic start on equal chance initiatives can rapidly and effectively change how people perceive their prospects.

Lost Potential

Ignoring this evidence, and in the throes of its successor selection process, in that period, the Tory administration ended the initiatives. What reason would someone in those regions vote for a political group that did that? This specific initiative is a single instance of what had the potential to be a game-changing Tory policy platform on levelling up, but that opportunity was completely wasted. Methods such as this can inspire hope and aspiration. Conversely, as the Conservatives found out, reneging on commitments of fair chances is the biggest blunder any political party can make. Voters punished the leadership for its failure but, perhaps most of all, for its unfulfilled commitments on social mobility.

Today’s Political Reality

Now the baton on life chances and equality of opportunity has been transferred to a opposition party. The levelling up rhetoric has been abandoned. Labour has its own political rhetoric of “eliminating hurdles to advancement”. The party that is steadily supplanting the failing Tories, the alternative party, also has its own terminology – “industrial revival”. The terminology to talk about new opportunities in areas like the one I come from, in my hometown. It claims that an historical manufacturing base can reincarnate into an industrial future.

For voters, it must seem like a repetitive cycle. Identical problem, alternative phrasing. But – as yet – no results.

Lessons for the Future

Should the current and alternative parties want to prevent the identical outcome, both these parties should understand the Tories’ mistakes on social mobility; that equal opportunity talk is one thing, but actual achievement of fairer outcomes is much harder. Our nation’s endemically weak equal opportunity remains the key issue for our country, with the next generation unable to get a proper professional launch, those putting in effort in occupations with minimal progress after the rent has been paid, and individuals nationwide without any genuine belief their next generation will be able to do any better in life than they have.

Elected officials can mention improved access repeatedly. Yet where is the party that has the comprehensive policy agenda on life chances? I observe no such party. Whoever gets there first, wins. Not just for their organization, but, more importantly, for a complete society that has desperately requires fair chances so urgently.