Sir John Major’s Royal Anniversary Trust Speech at Mansion House – 10 September 2025
The speech made by Sir John Major at Mansion House, London, on 10 September 2025.
Sir Damon, Ladies and Gentlemen ….
Congratulations in getting here on a day when the tube system is on strike: perhaps, one day, AI will replace London transport altogether. I live in hope.
Thirty years ago, I had the pleasure of congratulating the first winners of The Queen’s Anniversary Prizes – as they were then known – and addressing the first of many Prizewinners’ Dinners at Guildhall.
So, when the Royal Anniversary Trust invited me to speak to you, their Prizewinning alumni, supporters, and friends I was delighted to accept.
Much has changed in those thirty years. The world has moved on – and so has education ‒ in ways that are welcome, and some that are not.
Today, far more British students have the opportunity to attend university, together with growing numbers from overseas. The choice of subjects to study has widened, and reflects our modern world.
There is a greater demand for Science, Technology, Engineering and Maths; the search for places for the latter two courses is at an all-time high.
This interest in STEM subjects is excellent news for our future economy, but comes with the downside of a comparable decline in study of the Arts, Languages and History.
As Artificial Intelligence looms, the drop in Humanities Studies is likely to continue. Personally, I regret that ‒ although I cannot deny the necessity of school and University studies mirroring the national need.
Even so, my instinct is that our troubled world needs Humanities Studies as much – if not more – than in many past years.
To lose History is a shame. I have always believed that to prepare for the future one must understand the past, or previous mistakes will be repeated. Certainly, that is true of politics and public life. Too true, sadly, as we see today – both at home and overseas.
Although we are born with a unique DNA, it is our education and environment that shape us as adults. In particular, it teaches us how to think and make judgements. And, as adults, we need to see our country as it is ‒ and not as once it was.
Our United Kingdom is 70 million people in a world of 9 thousand million, and the reality of that is unmistakable: if we are to flourish in an ever more competitive world, we need the highest intellectual and vocational skills to safeguard our future. Our wellbeing will be rooted in our education.
I have a particular respect for education – perhaps because I had so little of it: my fault, I should add, not that of my school. But, post school, I had no choice but to study – for many years – to make up for what I had casually thrown away.
This experience had one great advantage. It taught me at a young age that learning is lifelong: it does not end upon leaving formal education. In many ways, that is where it begins. [Certainly, that has been my experience].
Experience of life tells me, too, that a rounded education must reach beyond the formal curriculum. Culture ‒ in all its aspects, Sport, inter-personal skills, and inquisitiveness must be stimulated and nourished if the young are to make the best they can of their lives. [Life must include leisure and pleasure as well as duty].
We cannot be content with things as they are: certainly not in education.
Although great improvements have been made – and continue to be so – not all children have the same good fortune, the same opportunities, in every part of our country: there are wide disparities.
It is beyond time that the promise of “Levelling Up” ‒ in education, in investment in the regions, in jobs, in social mobility ‒ is given political priority. The circumstances of birth should not determine the quality of life.
In saying this, I am talking of improving opportunities for those with little or none – not cutting back on the best to produce a false benchmark. That is not only self-defeating, it is wrong.
Our national interest is to nurture merit, not waste it – as, sadly, we often do. Destroying the best is short-sighted and foolish: improving the worst is a national obligation.
When I was leaving Primary School in the early 1950s, only 16 Universities in England offered Higher Education courses – to a total of 100,000 students. In those days, twice as many people laboured on farms as worked in financial services. The past truly was another country.
We are changing still ‒ only faster. Last year, over 2 million students were enrolled.
I talked once of what I called “a classless society”. One of my aims – within that much misunderstood ambition – was to seek parity of esteem between white and blue collar employment – between intellectual and vocational skills ‒ both of which are vital if our nation is to prosper and thrive.
Over the past thirty years, the numbers entering skills-based, vocational training have risen dramatically, and opened barriers to education that many felt were closed to them.
The learning of a Skill meets a national need, and offers personal independence, professional pride and – mostly – a better quality of life. It is, as they say, a “Win, Win”.
The demand for Skills will both change and grow in the years ahead.
I am delighted that The Queen Elizabeth Prizes evaluate and acknowledge those twin strands of intellectual and vocational skills.
I believe that the Royal Anniversary Trust is unique in bringing these two communities together, and recognising them to be of equal value. I warmly congratulate them on that.
Over recent years, in a testing environment, our economy has performed below our expectations. As we look ahead, our Universities and Colleges will educate the talent that can re-ignite growth – with all that means for our future.
Estimates tell us that Higher and Further Education contributes over half a trillion Pounds to our economy each year and – as the demand for STEM courses shows – it has the capacity to greatly increase that figure. As it does, it will contribute to a higher quality of life for everyone. To pervert an old saying, “Education is the root … of all progress”.
I don’t use those words idly. Our best Universities and Colleges are among world leaders in finding solutions to global problems.
- Was it not an Oxford team behind the Covid-19 vaccine?
- Was it not Scotland’s Rural College whose genetic selection trials are transforming milk yields for subsistence farmers in Africa?
- Was it not the University of Surrey which developed cutting edge satellite technology to aid the UK’s first space exploration?
The answer is “Yes”, “Yes” and “Yes” again.
And these are but three examples of many more.
Earlier, I referenced overseas students. Why do they come here ‒ these days at considerable financial cost? It is because these young people – from far away – see our country as a global leader in Higher and Further Education. People equate excellence in education with the United Kingdom, and it is our job to ensure they continue to do so.
Yet we must be watchful as innovation changes our world.
A mere thirty years ago, only a very few of our global population had access to the internet. Today it is nearly universal, and almost impossible to imagine life without it.
We had high hopes of the internet, and many of them have been met.
But … the internet has its dark side, too, and – at its worst – it is very dark indeed.
As policymakers grapple with this, they must police Artificial Intelligence to inhibit ‒ and, if possible, prevent ‒ its misuse. Education must navigate it, too ‒ and that challenge will be very great.
I hope educators will not be too daunted. Their role is crucial. Scientific advance will ensure that education is a life-long journey, not merely a youthful rite of passage. It is one of the principal sources of happiness, and success, and compassion – without which no conscience can be at ease. We are all in debt to those who teach us.
To have such a responsibility is a unique vocation ‒ to my mind, among the first in any land ‒
The legacy of education is our future, which is why this afternoon – on behalf of our country’s past, present and future pupils – it is my privilege to thank you all.