Social Mobility Index

Debate between Wes Streeting and Justin Madders

Tuesday 9th February 2016 Westminster Hall

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

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Percy. I congratulate the hon. Member for Norwich North (Chloe Smith) on securing this debate. I am pleased to have the opportunity to contribute as the chair of the all-party parliamentary group on social mobility.

Improving social mobility is arguably one of the biggest and most complicated challenges of our times. This country is too unequal, too closed and too divided. It is a country where, far too often, where a person is born and who they are born to, define what their life chances will be. The income gap between the richest and poorest in society continues to widen, and the UK stands alongside the United States in having the lowest social mobility among advanced nations.

As they progress through life, young people from the most disadvantaged areas are nearly 10 times less likely than those from the most advantaged to take up a place at a top university. Our professions are disproportionately populated with people who studied at Oxbridge or in private education; the all-party group will shortly launch an inquiry into access to the professions. Tackling such issues is not just a moral imperative but an economic one.

As my hon. Friend the Member for Mitcham and Morden (Siobhain McDonagh) said, the commission’s social mobility index is not a new concept, as it was pioneered by the Sutton Trust last year through its mobility map. However, it is instructive to look at both studies, as their findings were similar: that the issue is far more complex than the conventional wisdom of looking simply at rich areas versus poor areas, or urban versus rural.

Although the affluence of an area and the life chances of the young people who live there are undoubtedly linked, we now know that social mobility issues affect not only the poorest areas in our country but some of the wealthiest. In many cases, affluent areas are not doing as well by their disadvantaged children as places that are much more deprived. We also know that children living in similar areas, sometimes just a few miles apart, can have markedly different life chances.

Although the commission’s report considers local authorities, the Sutton Trust mobility map allows us to drill down into individual constituencies, where we can find significant differences within a local authority area. For example, in my council area of Cheshire West, City of Chester is shown to have a significantly higher level of social mobility than my constituency of Ellesmere Port and Neston, although they are both in the same local authority area and only a few miles apart. Such differences are simply not apparent in the commission’s index. In a local authority area with a population of more than 330,000, I suggest that pockets where social mobility is at its worst can be easily overlooked. Indeed, although a constituency basis is a much more useful indicator than a local authority one, I would go further: it ought to be done at a ward or super output area level.

Maybe we will get to that point in future, but we do not need that level of detail to conclude what is clear from both indexes: London and its commuter belt are pulling away from the rest of the country. Young people from disadvantaged backgrounds in those areas are far more likely than others in the rest of the country to achieve good outcomes in school. What is so valuable about the social mobility index and the mobility map is that at least we can now begin to map and question why such variations exist. Such is the variety of potential factors influencing outcomes that establishing the most effective way to improve social mobility can at times be a little like trying to nail blancmange to a wall, but there are some fundamentals with which we can start.

For example, we know that the effects of good teaching are especially significant for children from disadvantaged backgrounds. In one year with very effective teachers, a child can gain 1.5 years’ worth of learning, so we need to consider better policies to incentivise teachers to work in disadvantaged areas. We also need to give local authorities across the country the resources and powers to replicate what was done with the London challenge, which my hon. Friend the Member for Ilford North (Wes Streeting) discussed eloquently earlier. There is a huge amount of good practice out there. In London, we have seen that, through concerted effort by a range of partners, the gap between the most advantaged and the most disadvantaged pupils can be reduced.

I hope that this debate signals a genuine intention across all political parties to improve social mobility. I sense that it is there, but all good intentions need to be matched with a little self-awareness that some Government policies do not help social mobility but in fact hinder it. I have grave concerns about some of the recent changes to student finance and the proposals that will shortly be consulted on for changes to the nurse bursary system, which the shadow Minister will undoubtedly address in his comments.

[Wes Streeting]

My hon. Friend is giving an excellent speech. I also have concerns about housing. When I was growing up, I always had the security of the council flat where I lived, whereas many families in similar situations whom I represent live on the other side of London and commute in.