It’s not class war, it’s a fair crack of the whip

By Alan Milburn

So, the Conservatives have declared Labour’s efforts to get social mobility going a return to “class war”. What a joke! The social mobility white paper being published today – and the panel I’ll be leading on improving access to professional careers – is the reverse of that. It’s about levelling up not down. It’s not about intensifying social divisions. Instead it’s about breaking down social divisions by ensuring that people, regardless of their background, get a fair crack of the whip when it comes to realising their potential and talent.

I thought that’s what all the political parties were supposed to be signed up to. David Cameron has made much of the fact that his Conservatives will no longer be the party of privilege. If that is really the case they should get on board with the Government’s efforts to create upward social mobility in Britain.

It’s a tough old battle. But after a decades-long decline in social mobility it has now bottomed out. Government action in recent years has made a difference. Primary schools in the poorest areas have improved almost twice as fast as those in the most affluent. In secondary schools city academies are improving results at four times the national rate despite having twice the number of pupils on free school meals. Perhaps most critically of all the Government, by investing so heavily in early years education, has learned the lesson from the Scandinavian countries where universal childcare has enhanced mobility and narrowed inequality.

So on each of these fronts the progress of recent years lays the foundations for improved social mobility in future years. But here we have to be frank. The ossification of British society which set in over many decades will take more than one decade to unfreeze. The glass ceiling has been raised but it has not yet been broken. To do so we need to learn from evidence across the world about what makes for a more upwardly mobile society: an economic policy that prioritises high skills and quality jobs; a welfare system that encourages work not dependence; early years education that is comprehensive and high quality; Schools that have rising standards; learning that is for life; families that are supported; communities that are empowered; individuals that own assets, have choices and feel they have a real stake in society.

It is important that today’s White Paper takes action on all these fronts. In each case they require not less State – as some mistakenly believe is what the modern world demands – but a different sort of State. One that empowers, rather than controls.

Social mobility will not advance if we think it is only wealth that is unevenly distributed in our society – it is also power. When you are poor you have little power. The sense of hopelessness that clouds the poorest communities in our country grows out of disempowerment. If Britain is to get moving again socially, people need to be able not just to get a job or training or childcare but also to enjoy greater control and to have a bigger say in how they lead their lives. Of course beating crime, creating jobs, rebuilding estates can help. But I have come to believe that this cloud of despondency can only be dispelled through a modern participatory politics which allows both local communities and individual citizens to more evenly and directly share in power.

The changes we have made in the last decade lay the foundations for a Britain in which people can go as far as they have the talent to go, where prosperity and opportunity are widely shared. But unlocking our country so that it is open to aspiration and effort requires a new drive to fundamentally change the distribution of power in our society. We have made good progress in the recent past. I hope we can make even better progress in the future.