Clegg takes on social mobility
Nick Clegg has pledged to take responsibility for the coalition’s record on social mobility – while simultaneously warning achieving change is “like turning the wheel on an oil tanker”.
The deputy prime minister used a speech in central London to confirm former Labour Cabinet minister Alan Milburn’s position as an unpaid government adviser on the subject.
Mr Milburn had completed a study calling for drastic steps to be taken to address the problem for the last government, but his proposals were not adopted by Gordon Brown.
“We are well-disposed to the panel’s recommendations,” Mr Clegg said today. “So much so we have asked Alan to hold our feet to the fire.”
Addressing an audience at the thinktank Centre Forum, the Liberal Democrat leader said he would focus on differences in pre-school years, educational inequalities and levels of parental involvement in a bid to bring down some of the barriers to social mobility.
“Our coalition agreement has already set out a large number of reforms and programmes that will help improve the level of social mobility in the UK,” Mr Clegg said, as he announced a new ministerial group on the issue which he will chair.
“In addition, I will ensure that as a government we are addressing all the key drivers of social mobility, particularly at those key points in a young person’s life when they can become disconnected with the education and wider support system,” he added.
The deputy prime minister’s comments come on the 100th day of the coalition government and follow a George Osborne speech which tried to place the focus of the administration on Britain’s long-term economic prosperity.
Observers said the two speeches were further signs that senior figures in the coalition government are becoming increasingly concerned at the simplification of the political agenda into a purely deficit-based narrative.
“It’s really important when what looms in the foreground is there’s more to this government than cuts,” Mr Clegg said on the Today programme this morning.
“It’s something we have to do because I think it’s just wrong to hand on our debts to the next generation.”
Mr Milburn, who has been accused of being a coalition “collaborator” by former deputy prime minister John Prescott, said he had always been motivated by “the goal of an open mobile society”.
“For me, the job of politics is to make that possible by breaking down the barriers that prevent people from realising their potential,” he said in his letter of acceptance to Mr Clegg.
“In this new role I aim to fairly and independently assess the progress each set of institutions is making to a United Kingdom where there are many more opportunities for people, regardless of their starting point in life, to realise their aspirations.”
