Education and Social Mobility

Justin Madders Excerpts

Tuesday 22nd November 2016 Commons Chamber

[Justin Madders (Ellesmere Port and Neston) (Lab)]

Last week, in my capacity as the chair of the all-party group on social mobility, I attended the launch of the Social Mobility Commission’s annual report. What I heard amounted to a damning indictment of the status quo: for too long, we have been too ready to accept that those from poorer backgrounds will proportionally do worse; for too long, we have allowed privilege and connections to override ability and potential; and for too long, we have deluded ourselves that economic growth translates into increased prosperity and opportunity for all. Let us invest in our children in their early years and let us have a school system that offers opportunity for all, but let us not kid ourselves that that will be enough if we continue to have a country where access to opportunity is completely closed off to huge sections of society.

The all-party group on social mobility is currently conducting an inquiry into access to the professions. Our report is due out soon. We saw many similarities between the evidence we heard and the commission’s findings. One such area was internships. Too often, internships are not just a way to get a foot in the door but the only way to open the door at all. They have become a further compulsory step into many professions, but by their very nature they exclude many. We found that too often these placements are determined by existing connections. Be it a family or a business contact, the foot in the door is often available only to those who know someone on the other side of it.

Another area where we found the evidence remarkably consistent was in terms of the aspirations our young people have. They need role models, mentors and inspirers, people from their community who have been there and done it and who can say to them, “Yes you can be whatever you want to be.” For too many, however, that is simply not on the radar.

The evidence I heard during the inquiry persuaded me that it is simply not enough for us to encourage companies to do more. We need to develop a culture in which social mobility is on a par with protected characteristics in terms of career prospects. We rightly challenge when we see minority sections of society not getting an equal opportunity, so we should do the same here. We cannot allow the situation to continue where background is likely to be the biggest factor in determining chances of success in life.

I would like the largest companies to publish data every year on how many people they have recruited from the most disadvantaged backgrounds, and, crucially, how those people have progressed within that company. We need a commonly agreed, publicly available record of how individual companies are doing. Only then will we see the big change in attitudes we need. Among advanced nations, the UK stands alongside the United States in having low social mobility. We need only to look across the Atlantic to see where ignoring these issues over successive generations leads. We should be in no doubt that we are heading the same way. I feel it when I speak to people in my constituency—the anger, the frustration, the hopelessness—who see the lack of opportunity around them and fear the same or worse for their children. Automation and artificial intelligence are going to narrow the opportunity gap still further in the coming years. We need to act now before it is too late.