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While the beleaguered Tories convenes in its conference city for its annual party conference, it has a lot to reflect on regarding its future direction. It’s not even clear if a viable path exists at all. These are challenging circumstances for a governing group that now has little, if anything, new or unique to say to voters.

What Could Have Been

The situation might have been markedly improved if concrete steps had been made on an agenda that is important for people throughout the UK: Levelling up. However the previous administration did not possess the basic understanding on how to convert the popular slogan on levelling up into policy reality. Over twenty-four months after the general election, it discussed what the term even meant.

I found it bizarre, because I had previously explained to the Prime Minister what levelling up signified when we initially discussed about it during the contest for party leader. The phrase was a term I developed and used at the education ministry to talk about equal opportunity. It was our departmental mantra, and its purpose is clear: social mobility is the method by which we realize fair chances – without removing chances away from those who already have it, but rather by providing chances to those that lack them.

The Core Concept

An additional vital education department term we used, “talent is spread evenly around the UK, yet chances are not”, again was a deliberate expression, embodying the two halves of a social mobility strategy. First, talent spread evenly but not nurtured uniformly through our schools and colleges. Furthermore, opportunities not spread evenly by businesses or our economy. Therefore, education and business were essential to achieving better life chances. This constituted an priority about the community framework of our country – supporting individual capabilities and linking them with prospects.

What Levelling Up Became

How did levelling up evolve into under Johnson’s Conservatives? Local investment schemes administered out of the the relevant ministry. Decorative floral displays and reconfigured roundabouts and roads. An official policy document was published nearly three years after Johnson became leader, which saw current strategies relabelled under the recently branded agenda.

As a result, a broader social mobility agenda went undeveloped, as well as all the change that it might have driven – in funding, commerce, financial planning, revenue and in local regeneration. And, of course, in education, including a higher education sector that has become a scapegoat for leaders across parties – even though it remains the most powerful engine of social mobility for youth from modest backgrounds, personally, this country has had over the past 30 years. Maybe the only engine of social mobility, operating at scale.

The Importance of Aspiration

Hope is vital for our country to thrive. For people to have aspiration, there needs to be a believable feeling that hard work and results are linked; that if people aim high, they can achieve. For political leadership, being able to foster a sense of optimism about the tomorrow is critical. Studies by the Institute for Policy Research at the university and others, newly available, showed that the education department’s targeted regions I established during my tenure – community-focused methods to enhancing learning results – led to young people in those communities being up to nearly one-fifth more positive about their prospects than those in equivalent locations without these schemes in place. The research confirms: just making an sincere effort on fair opportunity strategies can quickly and positively change how people feel about their destiny.

Missed Opportunities

Oblivious to this, and in the middle of its post-Johnson leadership contest, in that period, the Tory administration closed opportunity areas down. Why would anyone in those regions vote for a party that made that decision? The opportunity areas policy is a clear case of what had the potential to be a transformative Tory policy platform on levelling up, but that opportunity was completely wasted. Approaches such as this can create belief and drive. Conversely, as the ruling party found out, reneging on commitments of social mobility is the costliest mistake any government can make. The public held accountable the leadership for its ineffectiveness but, above all, for its unfulfilled commitments on equal opportunity.

Today’s Political Reality

Currently the mandate on equal opportunity and equality of opportunity has passed to a Labour government. The previous terminology has been cast off. Labour has its own public messaging of “eliminating hurdles to advancement”. The organization that is steadily supplanting the struggling incumbents, the alternative party, also has its own message – “economic renewal”. The terminology to talk about fresh prospects in communities like the one I grew up in, in the region. It claims that an industrial past can be reborn into an revitalized economy.

For voters, it must appear as a Groundhog Day-style loop. Same issue, different language. But – as yet – no results.

What Must Change

Should the current and alternative parties want to avoid the same fate, both these parties should take lessons from the Tories’ mistakes on social mobility; that equal opportunity talk is simple terminology, but successful delivery of fairer outcomes is far more challenging. Our nation’s persistently low life chances 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 living expenses are met, and citizens throughout the UK without any actual expectation their next generation will be able to do improve in life than they have.

Politicians can discuss improved access however much they like. However, which party has the party that has the comprehensive policy agenda on life chances? I observe no such party. Whoever gets there first, prevails. Not only for their organization, but, more importantly, for a complete society that has never needed fair chances so badly.