Social Mobility

Lord Livermore Excerpts

Thursday 27th October 2016 Lords Chamber

[Lord Livermore (Lab)]

My Lords. I thank the noble Lord, Lord Holmes, for securing this debate. I know he has great commitment to this issue, not least through his work on the Select Committee on Social Mobility.

I also join others in saying that I am looking forward to the maiden speech by the noble Baroness, Lady Couttie. The issue of social mobility was the subject of my maiden speech earlier this year.

When we make the case for improving social mobility in our country, there should be a moral, a political and an economic dimension to our argument. The moral case is surely unarguable: that everyone deserves the same opportunities in life, irrespective of the family they were born into, the place where they live, or the school they attend; and that no one should be condemned to a life of poverty and low expectations simply because they were born poor. Instead, we should strive to build a society where your progress in life is determined by your aptitude, ability, effort and aspiration. So it should be of great concern that there is currently a gulf between the Britain we are and the Britain we should strive to be.

Today, the UK is one of the least socially mobile countries in the developed world. A boy born into a middle-class family is 15 times more likely to become middle class himself than a boy born into a working class family—odds unchanged over the past 100 years. My noble friend Baroness Morris referred to the fact that, by the age of five, a child from the poorest 10% of families will already be 19 months behind a child from the richest 10%. On the current trajectory, it would take 30 years before the attainment gap in schools between poorer children and their better-off classmates even halved; and it would take 50 years to close the gap between those parts of the country that send the most children to university and those that send the least. Of course, none of this is to say that social mobility never happens; it does, and many succeed against the odds. But that is the whole point—they have to swim against the tide if they are to get on.

This divide in our country was brought into sharp relief by the vote to leave the European Union. The correlation between those who voted to leave and those areas with the lowest rates of social mobility is hard to deny. Of the 65 areas of the UK identified by the Social Mobility Commission as the worst for education and employment prospects, only three voted to remain—so the political case for improving social mobility has become acute.

The idea that each succeeding generation will do better than the last is fundamental to an aspirational society, and fundamental to the fabric of Britain. But if so many feel they are consistently excluded from this idea—that their ambitions are consistently thwarted, while they see the rest of the country forging ahead—we create the space for a dangerous politics of resentment.

It is in this context that the Prime Minister's commitment to heal these divisions and build a country that works for everyone is so welcome. But we must ask whether this desire for a different kind of society is matched by plans capable of delivering it. Initiatives such as the new opportunity areas and the youth investment fund are, of course, welcome. However, if the Government’s highest-profile policy for social mobility is a return to grammar schools, then the answer is surely no.

To genuinely promote social mobility, we need a comprehensive strategy that includes employment support, housing, early years provision, vocational education, public health and parenting skills. Our consistent failure to meet the moral obligation to improve social mobility contributed to the vote to leave the European Union, which in turn has the potential to create real economic challenges for our country.

A strong economic case for high rates of social mobility has always existed: that we should minimise the loss of productive potential from talent that is never deployed. Indeed, an economic analysis by the Boston Consulting Group for the Sutton Trust estimated that closing the educational attainment gap could add as much as 4% to GDP. But leaving the European Union makes this case even more important. Now, more than ever, we cannot afford to waste anyone’s potential. We must make use of all the talents in our country as we seek to remain internationally competitive.

The economic consequences of Brexit, when it happens, have the potential to create a perfect storm for social mobility: less inward investment would mean fewer career opportunities for young people. Businesses leaving the UK—or corporation tax cuts or subsidies to induce them to stay—would reduce our tax base and the money available for deprived communities. A shrinking of the financial services sector would remove a powerful engine of social mobility. Any recession would disproportionately impact young people at the beginning of their careers, and reduced opportunities to work and travel freely within the EU would risk curtailing their horizons and aspirations.

We know what happens to social mobility in these circumstances: those from privileged backgrounds jump to the front of the queue for scarce job opportunities, ahead of their more disadvantaged counterparts.

At this time of profound economic change, it is vital that we embed our commitment to social mobility in the development of new policy within government. As the noble Lord, Lord Farmer, said, the Government have done this successfully elsewhere, ensuring, through the family test, that a family perspective is considered in every new policy.

I end by asking the Minister whether the Government will consider a similar initiative for social mobility, issuing guidance to government departments in the form of a social mobility test, to ensure that the impact on social mobility is recognised explicitly in all that the Government do.