Here’s a conundrum as we leave the Blair years behind us. Never has so much faith been placed in the idea of a society open to social mobility; never have so many politicians’ speeches been delivered in praise of a more classless society and the need to promote ability, regardless of background. Yet their rhetoric isn’t matched by the facts. Britain is becoming far less socially mobile. On the present indicators, we can only argue about whether it has stalled or is going backwards. What no one can convincingly argue is that it is going forwards. One of the oft-cited pieces of evidence is that of a celebrated study of children born in 1958 and children born in 1970. Those born in 1970 are more likely to have ended up poor themselves than the children born in 1958. There is no sign that the trend has changed.
So one of the vital tests of who is fit to govern Britain should be which party has the better ideas for improving the ability of bright children, regardless of background, to achieve their true potential. In the mid-1990s the Major government confidently boasted that Britain was the place of ‘opportunity for all!’ and the (then) backbencher David Willetts could assert ‘a picture of extraordinary social fluidity’ as a hallmark of Britain. As the product of a comprehensive and Oxford, I was inclined to believe that too. Now Mr Willetts and others bemoan the backward slide of social mobility. Even Blairites who have sought to promote this cause admit there is still ‘much to do’ — as they now say of things that haven’t been done.
Not all the blame can be placed at Blair’s door. Social mobility in Britain was probably overstated in the 1990s, so the problems lurk deeper and need renewed vigour and vision to solve them. That offers a new ‘Opportunity Knocks’ for a post-Blair generation of politicians. They are increasingly attracted by the meritocratic idea because they know that the public is sympathetic to the notion of combining justice and efficiency.
Interpreted as a dystopia by Michael Young in his sociological satire in the 1950s, meritocracy has undergone a revival among modernising politicians. Re-reading Young today, some of the predictions of the dire consequences of a meritocratic society sound ludicrous. As if the worst problem we would have to deal with would be the effects of a large, socially mobile, super-educated class: oh dear, however shall we cope? The other flaw in Young is the notion that those who did not thrive in a meritocracy would be especially downtrodden, demoralised and badly catered for. Yet many such people exist today, without there being any sign of a compensatory advance of the less obviously disadvantaged. How to make the welfare state more effective, fair and motivating for those worst equipped to cope with life is a proper and distinct concern of politics. To use it to excuse a reluctance to promote and reward talent is indefensible.
There is no inherent reason why the ladder of opportunity for those able to fulfil their potential — and not just at brain-surgeon level — should be an ‘engine of injustice’ for the rest. Tony Blair was the first Labour figure I am aware of who used the word ‘meritocracy’ as something positive, causing horror among Old Labour egalitarians clutching their Tawney and their Rawls. Now the Tory leader David Cameron declares baldly, ‘I am a meritocrat.’ Since I first wrote about the idea of reviving the argument about social mobility and how to promote it, last year, most interest in the subject has come from Team Cameron. ‘Have you got a reading list?’ was one plaintive request from a senior Cameronian.
Alas, Cameron’s arguments remain hazy and passionless. ‘One of the great things about this country is that it matters more where you’re going than where you come from,’ says the Tory leader. You think, Dave? It still isn’t remotely true that it doesn’t matter where you come from. As Willetts, now Tory education spokesman, admits, things are getting worse, not better.
The ability of the Cameronian message to penetrate beyond the south and into the northern suburbs and cities — without which he cannot win a convincing majority — depends on understanding thwarted aspiration and being determined to address it. This territory won’t go unclaimed for long. Rising Labour stars like David Miliband are keen to reinvigorate the debate. Two other young New Labour figures, the welfare minister Jim Murphy and pensions minister James Purnell, have also seen the prize and lunged for it. ‘The next few years will be a contest between aspiration and conservation,’ they write in the Times. ‘The party that wins that argument will win the next election.’
Theirs is, however, an optimistic reading of Gordon Brown’s intentions. The Chancellor often promoted ‘equality of opportunity’ (though never meritocracy) as an aim. He even gave a speech dwelling on Thomas Gray’s ‘mute inglorious Milton’ languishing, potential unfulfilled, in his grave. But he must explain how far he will depart from Labour orthodoxy to achieve more progress. His economic redistribution has not impinged on the life chances of children from poorer backgrounds. One major reason that schools are failing brighter pupils from poorer homes is that changes are being made far too slowly.
Perhaps Mr Brown will pleasantly surprise us and turn out to be a radical innovator in this area. Then again, perhaps not. His few words in support of Mr Blair’s city academies and trust schools measures have been lukewarm. We cannot say with confidence that he will build further on the idea of a more varied school landscape than his predecessor. What about the other lot? Most Tories believe in their hearts that the decline of grammars is to blame for failing the poor-but-able. No clear explanation has been forwarded for why Mr Cameron dropped selection, other than political convenience. It is the volte-face Tory candidates tell me they find most difficult to defend. As it happens, I am with him on this one. Or rather, with David Willetts, the education spokesman whose famous ‘two brains’ and ideological flexibility make him a kind of one-stop Kwikfit for Tory leaders requiring new ideas and evidence to back them up. Mr Willetts once wrote passionately about the need for schools to be able to select.
But New Willetts is surely right when he says that grammar schools are not the way to deliver a more socially mobile society now. That is not to say that they were not a major factor in their time, and a vocal group of beneficiaries often highlight this: ‘It worked for me so why not bring it back now?’ The practical problem supporters of meritocracy face today is that the fair allocation of rewards requires high levels of social mobility. Without that, the middle class, having achieved its position, simply hands on privilege to its children.
There is nothing wrong in parents seeking to do that. Policies intended to maximise the best outcomes for the widest number of people must, however, do rather more. The education charity the Sutton Trust studied an area with 12 per cent of children on free school meals, and discovered that at the grammar schools in the area only 2 per cent of children got free meals. One thing the surviving grammars cannot claim is that they are motors of greater opportunity for the poor.
The other evidence on which the Tory repositioning is based is Leon Feinstein’s 2002 report from the LSE, comparing able children from a disadvantaged background with less able children from middle-class homes. The two lines on the graph cross over shockingly early. Group A’s progress falls off sharply at the age of four or five. At the same point Group B begins to race ahead. The poor-but-bright child all too easily falls by the wayside in this race long before selection takes place. Pitting these children against each other at 11 is not fair or meritocratic. I would certainly argue for pupils to be taught in ability groups when they reach secondary level. That is a different proposition, of course, from creating selective schools, which are socially as well as academically selective. The gap between social circumstances is wider, the immiseration (cultural as well as economic) in poorer homes worse and the families more fragile than in the heyday of grammar schools.
A larger and more ambitious middle class is also good at protecting its attainments. One tactless Tory frontbencher notes that the ‘kids of estate agents’ are now just as pushed at school as the offspring of graduates. This double squeeze is one of the main reasons why the mobility gap has widened. What would begin to change things is a commitment by the parties to let themselves be judged on their record in closing it. That also means having the policies to produce more reliable supply of good primary and secondary schools, delivered faster than New Labour has managed. We still need to do much more to encourage autonomous new providers of schools within the state sector who come in to do things better, and force existing schools to emulate their achievements. Some Labour maximalists like Alan Milburn believe in a weighted voucher that would give more funding to the disadvantaged: the Lib Dem David Laws wants to increase the financial incentives for teachers in the poorest areas.
Worthy goals; but politicians seeking election as well as sainthood should not forget that many less affluent middle-class voters also fret that their children are being left behind in the education race, as they are priced out of private education and good catchment areas by the wealthy. Mr Willetts is set to lay out some long-awaited Tory substance here in the coming weeks, based on assessments of school reforms by Caroline Hoxby at Harvard. The doyenne of schools choice, she is anti-selection but supports bringing in a variety of providers, as rapidly as possible, to invigorate the state sector.
Where Mr Brown stands on this question will be a defining mark of his premiership. One of the better instincts of those who seek to govern us is a desire to right wrongs. Well, here’s a big one waiting for Gordon, Dave et al.
Meritocracy works. Anyone got a better idea?
Anne McElvoy is executive editor of the Evening Standard. Getting What We Deserve is broadcast on Radio Four at 10.45 p.m. this Sunday, repeated at 8.45 p.m. next Wednesday.