Harriet Dolby is a Parliamentary Researcher, a former President of the Oxford University Conservative Association and a team member of Next Gen Tories. 

A new ‘Class Unit’ has been announced by Bridget Philipson, the Minister for Women and Equalities, to improve ‘the lives of low-income families’, and to root out child poverty. This announcement coincides with Lucy Powell’s decision to loosen the curriculum in favour of ‘creativity’ and vocational skills.

And yet, these moves demonstrate Labour’s vision of being a party that continues to promote victimhood rather than actual solutions, as they embark on introducing a new socio-economic duty under the Equality Act. Education, when done well, can be a key implement to boost social mobility, and so it is clear where Labour should actually look to if they want to improve the outcomes of our young people, regardless of their respective socio-economic background.

Earlier this year, patriots stood aghast to find that Churchill’s statue was defaced, his posthumous memorial on parliament square condemned as ‘racist’. Subsequently, Twitter faced a torrent when the Bank of England announced their decision to substitute out British historical figures for animals on their banknotes.

Now, I’m as much a fan of a Squirrel Nutkin and Mrs Tiggy-Winkle as the next person, but are we really so ashamed of our past that we must resign to ignore it, and opt for mammals that can’t tweet something problematic?

This decline in civic pride, a collective guilt we have been forced to swallow, finds a root in our history curriculum.

We all know how the famous song goes. ‘William, William, Henry, Stephen, Henry, Richard, John, Hey!’ is a line seared into children who grew up on a diet of CBBC in the 2010s. Horrible Histories had a pivotal impact on so many of my peers, igniting a fascination of the past that led my Oxford college cohort to study the subject.

Yet, as fantastic as Horrible Histories is in informing us of ‘gory stories’, ‘woeful wars’ and ‘ferocious fights’, it is no substitution for actual, proper teaching in the classroom. The show itself is mostly snapshots, taking a sketch-show format and is thus rarely cultivating a consistent narrative or argument.

For a history education to be effective, it does not need to be about remembering certain facts – it should be about highlighting pivotal moments and how that feeds into the broader story of our nation.

In my primary school, our history curriculum could be surmised into three themes: Victorians, early Britain and the Tudors. Visiting a Victorian-style school and being given the dunces hat; hearing about nearby Sutton Hoo; or being able to sing ‘divorced, beheaded, died, divorced beheaded, survived’ were memorable highlights.

However, what we missed from these themes was why were they important. Of course, the prospect of being sent to a workhouse or up a chimney reminds us of the extent to which we have ‘progressed’, but we were not taught how or why we got to where we are now.

In fact, despite being from his birthplace and former constituency, I did not formally learn about Cromwell until university level. The man who abolished the monarchy, remoulded the constitutional settlement we live under today and shaped the relationship between Parliament and the Crown for centuries, neglected until higher education.

To most school leavers, he is a vague name that probably did something important. I am not suggesting for a moment that children need to read Geoffrey Elton or John Russell, that would be absurd. It is not an academic historiographical study, it is basic national literacy. We need to teach Britain why it is the way it is.

Despite this core value that should sit at the heart of what we are teaching future generations, I was appalled to hear that my younger brother, aged 9, during lockdown was being taught the Tang Dynasty.

Whilst Fukuyama may utilise it as a key case study as to the importance of a more meritocratic bureaucracy, the abstract nature of this epoch at such a young age was simply too complex for him to comprehend. The inevitable result of disinterest ensued, much to my mother’s frustration during the dreaded home-schooling era.

The base set of knowledge should be about our own history, about what makes us British, and use that as a springboard to compare against other nations, and systems.

As Lord Biggar has been an outspoken critic of, as a nation the discourse around the British Empire has been construed as one that we should solely apologise and self-flagellate for, rather than one we can treat with nuance. Britain’s role in the transatlantic slave trade is very real and abhorrent, it should obviously be taught. But the other half of the story is often missed out. What about our role in the abolition of slavery?

‘The unweary, unostentatious, and inglorious crusade of England against slavery must be regarded as among the three or four perfectly virtuous pages comprised in the history of nations’. As William Edward Hartpole Lecky, political theorist, articulates, England sacrificed and took great risks to stop the practice.

From William Wilberforce MP pushing for the Slave Trade Act of 1807 which banned the trading of enslaved people in the British empire; to Foreign Secretary Viscount Castlereagh putting pressure on allies to follow suit at the Treaty of Vienna negotiations in 1815; Britain helped to pioneer an attitudinal and practical shift. And when such changes were not enacted, the West African Squadron sent British ships to patrol the Atlantic, resulting in the Royal Navy capturing hundreds of slave ships, and freeing 150,000 captives over more than 50 years.

A history of a peoples is not static. Actions that happened centuries ago cannot be the only descriptor of Britain. It is clear we have selective amnesia when it comes to this topic. Yet, with the CofE’s project spire, and Labour’s abhorrent Chagos deal, it is clear how it is easy to convince ourselves of a false truth.

Boomers often label young people as unpatriotic, supported by the fact that young people would today prefer a strongman leader. Perhaps it is not unreasonable to expect that younger people are willing to opt out of democracy as the current system is not working for them: they cannot afford a house; taxes have skyrocketed, and graduate jobs are limited.

But this sentiment is pinned on the dwindling collective memory of wartime, WW2 was supposedly the ‘height’ of our great nation, a time of Churchill, the Blitz spirit and personal sacrifice.

Whilst WW2 saw the triumph over Nazism, British history is more than solely WW2. Churchill was a great leader, but he was not the only great leader, nor the only great man. We are not taught about the pioneering individuals who shaped our constitution, our infrastructure and our modern way of life.

How can we expect a generation to be ardent defenders of their nation when we have not given them the tools to do so. I am not asking for some Soviet-style propaganda machine, or a recitation of the national anthem at the start of every school day. I am merely calling for a more rational and constructive curriculum; one that allows for debate and a scope for nuance.

Paddington bear nationalism is simply not enough to see our way through future conflicts or national crisis. We need something more robust, more resolute. Lucy Powell better get it right, it starts with this next generation: the members of Generation Alpha in our classrooms now.