Read: Coalition representing 250,000 UK workers targets social mobility barriers

Social mobility leaders and some of Britain’s biggest employers have joined forces to launch a new Equality of Opportunity Coalition aimed at driving fairer access to UK opportunities. 

 Rt Hon Justine Greening, founder of the Social Mobility Pledge, has teamed up with Steven Cooper, former co-chair of the Social Mobility Commission, now CEO of Aldermore Bank, to create the Equality of Opportunity Coalition. 

Coalition members are committed to tracking and reporting the socio-economic diversity of their employees in the UK’s first wide scale pilot of its kind.

Employers will answer socio-economic diversity questions which were initially developed by the UK Government Cabinet Office in 2017, and later updated by the Social Mobility Commission earlier in 2021.  

The organisations involved at launch employ almost a quarter of a million people, including employers as diverse as the Co-op Group, UK Power Networks, Aldermore Bank, the University of York and Essex County Council. Many more organisations, spanning the public and private sectors, are expected to join them in the coming months. 

 The Equality of Opportunity Coalition will monitor their socio-economic data and report it transparently. The work will also enable employers to benchmark themselves and share best practice on socio-economic tracking, providing a wider picture of social mobility and career progression across different sectors. 

The pilot is part of the Purpose Coalition’s wider launch of collective levelling up measures to track progress, being published today as part of the Levelling Up Goals. The metrics have also been designed with input from the Office for National Statistics to track progress on levelling up. 

 Rt Hon Justine Greening said:

“What gets measured gets done. If Britain wants to level up, we must be able to measure progress.

“For too long, what happens to people’s chance to progress and make the most of their potential once they get into careers has felt like a black box, where data is difficult to reach.  This groundbreaking pilot launching the Equality of Opportunity Coalition is rightly using validated questions on socio-economic diversity from the Government’s own Social Mobility Commission. The results will enable us and our employers for the first time to track progress and then we can learn from what’s working.

“Employers from all sectors can be engines for social mobility through the opportunities they provide. It’s fantastic leadership from these organisations who are part of the pilot, and I hope their leadership can encourage all companies, particularly larger ones, to track this diversity alongside other key measures on gender and ethnicity. Alongside the wider measures we are setting out today to track levelling up, this is a key step forward on driving greater social mobility and equality of opportunity.” 

 A Steering Group of universities participating will develop a programme of research work to ensure the growing evidence base from employers sharing results can produce a significant insight into the wider issue of job and career progression.

For more information about the Equality of Opportunity Coalition, please visit www.equalityofopportunitycoalition.org 

What are the ‘wider measures to track levelling up’ being launched?

They align to the 14 Levelling Up Goals framework being used by employers in the public and private sector to shape their levelling up strategies. Each of the 14 Goals now has metrics that have been reviewed by the Office for National Statistics and will enable more transparency on the progress being made on equality of opportunity.

Details can be found here:https://www.levellingupgoals.org

What socio-economic diversity questions are employers going to be using?

 The Cabinet Office/Social Mobility Commission socio-economic questions were developed by the Cabinet Office originally in 2018 and then revalidated by the SMC in 2021, in conjunction with others, including the Social Mobility Pledge. They have already been used across Government Departments, with the results reported by the Social Mobility Commission in 2021: https://www.gov.uk/government/news/action-plan-to-increase-socio-economic-diversity-in-the-civil-service

The questions are:

Key Question 1: What was the occupation of your main household earner when you were about aged 14?

Uses the OECD occupational splits and when tested was both easy for respondents to understand and gets the highest response rates in testing.

Question 2: Which type of school did you attend for the most time between the ages of 11 and 16?

•  A state-run or state-funded school

• Independent or fee-paying school

• Independent or fee-paying school, where I received a means tested bursary covering 90% or more of the total cost of attending throughout my time there

• Attended school outside the UK

• I don’t know

• I prefer not to say

Per Social Mobility Commission, this question shows “extreme economic and cultural advantage”.

Question 3: If you finished school after 1980, were you eligible for free school meals at any point during your school years?

•  Yes

• No

• Not applicable (finished school before 1980 or went to school overseas)

• I don’t know

• I prefer not to say

Per the Social Mobility Commission, this is a measure of extreme economic disadvantage and easy to understand.

Question 4: Did either of your parents attend university and gain a degree (e.g. BA/BSc or equivalent) by the time you were 18? [For employers with a graduate scheme]

When are the questions being asked?

Participating employers in the Equality of Opportunity Coalition are committing to add these questions to their existing employee surveys, when they next take place over the next year. Individual employers can provide further details on when their employee surveys are carried out. Some, like the Co-op Group have already begun trialling using the questions.

How will the results be used?

Individual Employers:

Employers are committing to publish the results of their socio-economic employee tracking, showing diversity at different levels in their organisation.

These results by employer will be accessible on employers websites as part of their annual reporting and once available on our dedicated website.

Benchmarking and Sharing of Best Practice:

The employers piloting this approach will be able to benchmark their results against other organisations. As the evidence base grows through more employers taking part, a Steering Group drawn from the Levelling Up Universities Coalition will produce a programme of research over the course of 2022 and 2023 to make sure the maximum insights are gained from the efforts of employers in tracking and reporting.