Read: Businesses are already leading the levelling up agenda

The message was clear in the Queen’s Speech this week that the levelling up agenda remains a key focus for the Government, as the legislation that will take us to the next election was announced.

It is competing, however, against a rapidly deteriorating cost of living crisis and a major international conflict threatening the global rules-based order. As Michael Gove has acknowledged, the fiscal climate those issues create makes tackling entrenched geographical inequalities much more challenging, but they also serve to highlight how crucial it is to achieve it.

There were announcements made on schools, regeneration and lifelong learning which all have an impact on access to opportunity. The 12 Levelling Up Missions in the Levelling Up White Paper are to be set into law, with a commitment for the Government to report on each so that it can be held to account.

Some thought that the legislative programme announced this week was not robust enough to meet the levelling up challenge. Yet that risks misunderstanding the role of the Queen’s Speech within the British legislative system. For despite the pomp and ceremony which accompanies the state opening of Parliament at which the government’s legislative programme is set out, what is actually announced on the day is inevitably only a partial communication of a government’s purpose. The absence of detail is often just an indication that ministers have not yet reached a consensus on more imaginative substantive proposals which are still to be thrashed out behind the scenes. The measures that are read out are those which have cleared the bar of cabinet approval at that time. What ultimately passes into law, reflecting parliamentary debate and hopefully public sentiment, can have significantly more impact. That may prove to be the case with a number of the bills announced this week, including the Levelling Up Bill.

Nevertheless, the key test for the Government is to take effective action on the important and immediate issue – the cost of living crisis - without crowding out enduring focus on the longer term challenge of levelling up. Discussion of further fiscal measures that could help address the rising cost of living pointedly took place at a Cabinet meeting outside the capital, in Stoke-on-Trent, and served to highlight that legislative change is only one of the tools available to government, and not always the most effective.

Whether by legislative or fiscal means, the Government must also keep sight of a longer-term reform programme that will deliver meaningful change. Ministers should keep in mind the role that businesses and institutions can play in helping their colleagues, customers and communities weather this storm. The best, including many members of the Purpose Business Coalition, responded effectively during the pandemic and are now working hard to best mitigate inflationary pressures on their stakeholders.

The Purpose Coalition is already working with a range of businesses to shape and develop the levelling up agenda. At a Parliamentary evidence session earlier this week with Jo Gideon, the Vice Chair of the backbench BEIS Committee, a range of our partners were able to discuss some of their innovative ideas for helping people cope with the cost of living crisis which will be developed over the next few weeks.

We will be publishing a cost of living best practice White Paper to highlight some of the work that is being carried out by Purpose Coalition businesses across the UK. Our members are showing leadership  with the support they are giving to the communities they serve in difficult economic times. They can also help frame and develop a much needed public debate more broadly about what it means to be purpose led and how that can deliver a positive social impact across the business and public environment. 

Lord Walney