Social Mobility

Peter Bone Excerpts

Wednesday 12th February 2020 Westminster Hall

[Several hon. Members rose—]

[Mr Peter Bone (in the Chair)]

Order. It might be useful for the House to know that I have four Back Benchers wanting to catch my eye and we will begin the winding-up speeches at 5.10 pm.

--- Later in debate ---

[Marion Fellows (Motherwell and Wishaw) (SNP)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Bone. I congratulate the right hon. Member for Bexleyheath and Crayford (Sir David Evennett). Is it not good that another further education lecturer is responding for the Scottish National party? We both know the importance of further education and how it helps to increase social mobility.

The latest state of the nation report says that

“social mobility has stagnated over the last four years at virtually all stages from birth to work”,

which is an utterly shocking indictment of the UK Government. It highlights the way in which inequality is entrenched in Britain, with someone born privileged likely to remain privileged, while someone born disadvantaged may have to overcome barriers to improve their and their children’s social mobility. Urgent action needs to be taken to close the privilege gap. The report also praised the Scottish Government for making Scotland

“more socially mobile, as a person’s occupation is now less determined by the occupation of one’s parents”,

and for

“giving consideration to improving social mobility by introducing a duty on public bodies to reduce socio-economic disadvantage”,

which we do not have in the rest of the UK.

I, too, am socially mobile. My dad was a corporation milkman and my mother was a cleaner. I was the first in my whole family to go to university, in 1967. A lot of what happened to me was because of my parents’ belief in education and the fact that their children should get the chances that they did not. However, it was also because they worked hard, and got the rewards of working hard, in a way that families nowadays do not. We hear so much about work being the best way out of poverty. That is not entirely true—not for someone in the gig economy on what is not, in fact, a living wage. Most people on benefits are in working families, and there are children in poverty across the United Kingdom in families in which both parents work. This scandal should not escape us, and we should do everything we can to end it. The Scottish Government are working to help Scottish families—the Scottish child payment is about to come on board—but only 16% of social security is devolved to Scotland, so they cannot do everything that they would like. Children are the start; and if we give children across the UK the best possible start, social mobility should follow.

Education has been mentioned. As I said, I was educated and became socially mobile. I was economically inactive for a number of years—I had three children—but was able to go back into the workforce at a far higher level. If we educate women especially, we educate generations after them. That is an absolute fact, and I stand here as proof of it. The SNP Government have invested record amounts in schools, to close the poverty-related attainment gap. Hon. Members should not listen to everything said against education in Scotland. It is improving. I know from my experience in further education that giving money helps, but it is also about the commitment of the people who work in education.

The Scottish Government have a uniform fund, enabling children to go to school and be like their peers. A child who goes to school and is like their peers will learn better, learn more and will feel able to progress. The Scottish Government have also expanded the education maintenance allowance in Scotland, but it has been scrapped here. We have to ask why, given that it is socially advantageous to give children from poorer backgrounds money to allow them to stay at school and increase their educational abilities.

I absolutely agree with the hon. Member for Sevenoaks (Laura Trott). Yes, going to a good university is really important, which is why places like St Andrews, one of the leading UK universities, actively encourages children, and is actively encouraged by the Scottish Government—

[Mr Peter Bone (in the Chair)]

Order. I am sorry to interrupt the hon. Member, but because we are very close to time, Opposition spokespeople should only have five minutes. You have exceeded that, so I am sure that you are about to bring your speech to a close.

[Marion Fellows]

I was indeed. Will the Minister tell us whether her Government will follow the Scottish Government and commit to a socioeconomic duty in England and Wales, and whether they will look at steps that the Scottish Government have already taken to increase social mobility?

[Mike Kane (Wythenshawe and Sale East) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Bone. I welcome the Minister to her new role. I know from my time on the Front Bench that she takes a keen interest in education. I congratulate the right hon. Member for Bexleyheath and Crayford (Sir David Evennett) on securing the debate. He has a long-standing interest in this matter and has raised it on the Floor of the House on numerous occasions. I just hope that his colleagues at the top of the party will continue to listen. He is right that it is a moral argument, which was made crystal clear in his comments.

I am a First Generation ambassador for Manchester Metropolitan University and have trained numerous working-class young people at A-level about going to university for the first time. Several of them will visit Parliament in the next few weeks. We raise money from the private sector to help the programme, and I am proud of the work that I do as a constituency MP on this matter.

My hon. Friend the Member for Ellesmere Port and Neston (Justin Madders) mentioned social mobility. I have to say that I disagree with his saying that London is the economic and cultural capital of Great Britain. As a Manchester United fan, he should know better. However, it was an excellent speech. He said that opportunity has gone backwards and social mobility is going backwards. I thank him for his work in Parliament on this the subject.

The hon. Member for Henley (John Howell), as ever in education debates in Westminster Hall, made really good points about apprenticeships and how important they are to working-class communities getting on. I visited Airbus in Broughton recently and saw working-class young men and women obtaining level 4 and 5-equivalent degrees on the shop floor and coming out with no debt whatsoever. He also spoke about social housing, which was key for me. I had a secure tenancy growing up, even though I grew up in a council flat on a council estate in Manchester. How many young people nowadays get that?

What my hon. Friend the Member for Barnsley East (Stephanie Peacock) said about music resonated with me. She has one of the best choirs in Europe in her constituency. Music, arts and culture are a great way to raise aspiration. She is a fantastic representative of a coal-mining community, and she said that those communities need sustained and long-term investment. I thank the hon. Member for Sevenoaks (Laura Trott) for her ambassadorship for the Sutton Trust. She is right: we need more working-class kids going to Russell Group universities. I have some appalling statistics of free-school-meal kids who cannot really get into my fantastic local Russell Group university. The numbers are so few. We have to work harder.

The hon. Member for Motherwell and Wishaw (Marion Fellows) clearly said that the education of women is key to raising social mobility. However, with austerity, the economics we have had and the lack of social justice, it is no wonder that it is stalling. It is worth noting that there was no explicit reference to social mobility in the Queen’s Speech. It has stagnated. That is not my view; that was the view of the Social Mobility Commission, which is part-sponsored by the Government. Members may recall that the board of the Commission resigned en masse in 2017 because it thought that the Government were not taking this seriously enough.

A 2017 Social Mobility Commission report stated:

“There is a fracture line running deep through our labour and housing markets and our education system.”

In other words: our society is divided and unequal. As my hon. Friend the Member for Ellesmere Port and Neston pointed out, the then social mobility commissioner stated that appointments to key commission roles were left vacant for years, and went on to say in an interview in The Sunday Times that the Government had shown

“indecision, dysfunctionality and a lack of leadership”.

It took more than six months for the Government to appoint a new commission, so there was no doubt at that point that the Government were not prioritising the issue. However, the new commission revealed that more than half a million more children were living in poverty than in 2012. Furthermore, levels of social mobility remained “virtually stagnant” since 2014—almost five wasted years.

I am extremely proud of my country, but the report by the United Nations special rapporteur that was published last year made me feel ashamed. The report described how our social safety net had been badly damaged by drastic cuts in Whitehall, how the glue that held British society was coming unstuck, deliberately removed and replaced with a harsh, uncaring ethos.

[Mr Peter Bone (in the Chair)]

Order. I am sorry to interrupt the shadow Minister, as this is an important debate, but we have limited time. He is over his five minutes.