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As the beleaguered Tories convenes in Manchester for its annual party conference, it has plenty to consider regarding its next steps. There is uncertainty if a viable path remains open. We are in challenging circumstances for a political party that now has little, if anything, new or unique to say to voters.

The Missed Opportunity

Things could have turned out so different if concrete steps had been made on an agenda that resonates with people nationwide: Equal opportunity. Yet the former leadership hadn’t got the first clue on how to convert his zeitgeisty rhetoric on social mobility into policy reality. Over twenty-four months after the general election, it debated what the phrase actually signified.

I was perplexed, because I had clearly defined for Johnson what levelling up meant when we originally talked about it during his leadership campaign. This terminology was language I created and used at the DfE to talk about life chances. It served as our departmental mantra, and its definition is clear: social mobility is the approach by which we realize equality of opportunity – not by taking chances away from those who possess it, but rather by extending opportunities to those that are without.

Fundamental Idea

An additional vital education department term we used, “potential is equally shared throughout the nation, but opportunity is not”, again was a purposeful phrase, representing the dual components of a social mobility strategy. Initially, ability distributed uniformly but not nurtured uniformly through our schools and colleges. Second, access not provided uniformly by businesses or our economic system. Therefore, schools and companies were key to achieving improved equality of opportunity. This constituted an mission about the societal structure of our country – supporting individual capabilities and providing access to chances.

What Levelling Up Became

How did the social mobility agenda evolve into under the Tory administration? Local investment schemes overseen from the the relevant ministry. Street beautification and reconfigured roundabouts and roads. An official policy document was launched nearly three years after the leadership change, which saw ongoing initiatives repackaged under the fresh social mobility slogan.

Therefore, a broader social mobility agenda went unpursued, as well as all the change that it could have inspired – in funding, commerce, fiscal strategy, tax and in community development. Moreover, in schooling, including a higher education sector that has become a scapegoat for politicians of all stripes – despite the fact that it remains the primary vehicle of life improvement for individuals from less privileged homes, like me, this country has had in recent decades. Perhaps the sole mechanism of social mobility, working extensively.

The Role of Ambition

Ambition is crucial for our country to thrive. To foster ambition, there needs to be a believable feeling that hard work and results are connected; that if people dream big, they can achieve. For any government, being able to instil a sense of optimism about the years ahead is critical. Analysis by the academic institution at Bath University and others, newly available, showed that the education department’s targeted regions I established during my tenure – community-focused methods to boosting academic achievement – led to students in those areas being up to nearly one-fifth more hopeful about their future than those in comparable communities without these programmes in place. The data shows: just making an genuine beginning on pro-social mobility policy can quickly and positively change how people perceive their future.

Squandered Chances

Oblivious to this, and in the middle of its successor selection process, in that period, the Conservative government terminated the programmes. What reason would someone in those communities vote for a party that took that action? This specific initiative is a clear case of what might have become a transformative Tory policy platform on social mobility, but that possibility was completely wasted. Strategies such as this can generate optimism and ambition. Conversely, as the ruling party learned, breaking the promise of equal opportunity is the biggest blunder any political party can make. The electorate penalized the administration for its ineffectiveness but, perhaps most of all, for its broken promises on levelling up.

Present Circumstances

Currently the mandate on equal opportunity and equal chances has been transferred to a Labour government. The previous terminology has been cast off. The current administration has its own political rhetoric of “breaking down the barriers to opportunity”. The organization that is steadily supplanting the failing Conservative party, the challenger, also has its own language – “industrial revival”. It’s a phrase to talk about fresh prospects in communities like the one I was raised in, in South Yorkshire. It claims that an former economic strength can be reborn into an industrial future.

For the public, it must seem like a déjà vu experience. Similar challenge, different language. However, so far, no progress.

Lessons for the Future

Should the current and alternative parties want to prevent the same fate, the respective organizations should understand the Tories’ mistakes on levelling up; that fair chance language is simple terminology, but effective implementation of fairer outcomes is far more challenging. Britain’s persistently low social mobility remains the primary challenge for our country, with youth unable to get a good job beginning, those putting in effort in full-time jobs with few results after the living expenses are met, and citizens throughout the UK without any real hope their children will be able to do advance in life than they have.

Leaders can talk about fairer opportunities however much they like. However, which party has the party that has the thorough strategy on social mobility? None appear to exist. Whoever gets there first, wins. Not just for themselves, but, more importantly, for a entire nation that has urgently needs fair chances so desperately.