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As the beleaguered Conservative party meets in Manchester for its annual party conference, it has plenty to consider regarding its next steps. Doubt remains if a clear direction is available. We are in challenging circumstances for a political party that now has little, if anything, new or unique to say to the public.

An Alternate Reality

It could have been so different if concrete steps had been made on an policy focus that is important for people throughout the UK: Equal opportunity. But the former leadership did not possess the slightest idea on how to turn the trendy talk on levelling up into actual implementation. During the initial period after the 2019 election, it argued over what the term truly represented.

It seemed strange to me, because I had clearly defined for Johnson what levelling up meant when we originally talked about it during the contest for party leader. The phrase was language I created and used at the DfE to talk about equal opportunity. It served as our core mission, and its definition is straightforward: social mobility is the approach by which we realize fair chances – not by taking opportunity away from those who already have it, but rather by extending chances to those that are without.

The Core Concept

Another crucial ministry expression we used, “potential is equally shared around the UK, however access isn’t”, again was a intentional wording, embodying the two parts of a fairness agenda. First, ability distributed uniformly but not developed consistently through our schools and colleges. Furthermore, opportunities not spread evenly by employers or our market. Therefore, learning and employment were essential to achieving improved equality of opportunity. This was an agenda about the societal structure of our country – fostering people’s potential and providing access to chances.

What Levelling Up Became

How did the social mobility agenda evolve into under Johnson’s Conservatives? Local investment schemes overseen from the the relevant ministry. Hanging baskets and reconfigured roundabouts and roads. A government strategy was released almost thirty-six months after Johnson became leader, which saw ongoing initiatives relabelled under the fresh social mobility slogan.

As a result, a wider fairness strategy went ignored, as well as all the improvement that it could have inspired – in funding, commerce, fiscal strategy, tax and in place-making. Additionally, in education, including a higher education sector that has become a punchbag for elected officials – even though it remains the primary vehicle of life improvement for individuals from less privileged homes, including myself, this country has had throughout modern times. Perhaps the only engine of fair chances, functioning widely.

Why Hope Matters

Hope is crucial for our country to thrive. To foster ambition, there needs to be a credible sense that hard work and results are related; that if people aspire, they can succeed. For any government, being able to foster a feeling of hope about the tomorrow is critical. Analysis by the academic institution at Bath University and others, recently released, showed that the education department’s targeted regions I established during my tenure – locally targeted strategies to boosting academic achievement – led to students in those areas being up to nearly one-fifth more optimistic about their prospects than those in equivalent locations without these schemes in place. The data shows: just making an sincere effort on fair opportunity strategies can quickly and positively change how people view their prospects.

Squandered Chances

Ignoring this evidence, and in the middle of its successor selection process, in that period, the Conservative government closed opportunity areas down. Why would anyone in those communities vote for a party that did that? The opportunity areas policy is a single instance of what could have been a game-changing administration strategy on social mobility, but that chance was completely wasted. Approaches such as this can inspire hope and aspiration. On the other hand, as the Conservatives found out, reneging on commitments of fair chances is the biggest blunder any government can make. The public punished the administration for its incompetence but, perhaps most of all, for its unfulfilled commitments on levelling up.

The Current Landscape

Now the mandate on equal opportunity and equality of opportunity has been transferred to a Labour government. The levelling up rhetoric has been cast off. The current administration has its own political rhetoric of “removing obstacles to success”. The political group that is increasingly displacing the failing incumbents, the challenger, also has its own language – “reindustrialisation”. It’s a phrase to talk about fresh prospects in regions like the one I grew up in, in South Yorkshire. It suggests that an former economic strength can be reborn into an industrial future.

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

The Way Forward

If Labour and Reform UK want to escape the identical outcome, both these parties should take lessons from the previous government’s errors on social mobility; that fair chance language is simple terminology, but effective implementation of improved opportunities is far more challenging. Our nation’s persistently low equal opportunity remains the key issue for our country, with the next generation unable to get a good job beginning, those laboring in employment with minimal progress 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.

Elected officials can mention improved access however much they like. But where is the organization that has the complete plan on equal opportunity? None appear to exist. Whoever gets there first, wins. Not just for themselves, but, crucially, for a complete society that has never needed equal access so desperately.