Making the case for equality goes to the heart of the progressive dilemma in British politics: how to construct a viable electoral coalition that enables parties of the centre-left to govern. The orthodoxy was that New Labour should pursue equality by stealth since there is little appetite among the electorate at large either for punitive taxation, or large-scale redistribution. This assumption framed Labour’s strategy in three successive elections.

A decade on, that orthodoxy may actually be an obstacle to Labour demonstrating its salience as a credible governing party. The parameters of the debate about equality in Britain have been recast. But also voters’ attitudes to equality – even in Middle Britain – are understandably complex and even contradictory. Public opinion can be altered according to who is setting the terms of debate in the country. The progressive challenge is to drag the political centre of gravity to the left.

For this reason, public attitudes are central to debates about inequality. According to a recent YouGov poll commissioned for the Fabian Society, the British public are overwhelmingly in favour of a fair and equal Britain. Ninety six per cent of respondents said it was a ‘good idea’ for Britain to be a place where no child grows up in poverty. Eighty five per cent thought that the gap between rich and poor ought to be smaller. There was also strong objection to the persistence of discrimination. Ninety four per cent of the public, for example, felt that nobody should experience discrimination because of their disability.

The survey also suggests a desire for Labour to go further than it has done so far: only 34 per cent felt that Britain had become fairer in the last 10 years. Even broken down by party affiliation, 77 per cent of Conservative voters approved of cutting income inequality, compared to 82 per cent of Labour voters. Support for reducing relative disadvantage cuts across all regions, ages, and socio-economic groups. The recent British Attitudes Survey (BSA) confirms these findings, suggesting that more than 75 per cent of voters think the gap between rich and poor in Britain is too large.

This also suggests that the nature of the debate in Britain is changing. It is no longer only about the ‘have-nots’, as inequality impacts on a broader cross-section of the British public, including the affluent middle class. It reflects what the Yale academic Joseph Hacker describes as ‘the great risk shift’, where insecurity grips all of society apart from ‘the richest of the rich’, creeping into the lives of middle-class families.

It is important to acknowledge the growing prevalence of insecurity and inequality as a consequence of the economic changes of the last two decades. While globalisation and technological advances have generated enormous rewards for the wealthy and well-educated, the gains are very unevenly distributed. It suggests that global markets tend to polarise incomes and opportunities even more sharply than was the case 20 or 30 years ago.

This is clear from recent studies of the British labour market. For example, the salaries of chief executives in FTSE 100 companies are now more than 125 times the wages of the average shop floor worker. Economic insecurity is all-pervasive: the likelihood of a worker facing a 50 per cent or greater drop in family income over time has more than doubled since the early 1990s. This reinforces inequalities across the generations, as the disjuncture in life chances opens up between the children of professionals and those from families with few marketable skills. Another facet of heightened inequality is the break down of the intergenerational contract: the disparity between those enjoying the fruits of the long boom, and the young people supporting them in retirement.

This is as much an issue for Middle Britain as for the less affluent. Inequality touches the lives of most families: the inability of younger workers to get on the housing ladder, the precariousness of company pensions, the increasing stress and strain of working life, and the decline in relative social mobility since the early 1970s. Then there is the indirect cost of inequality expressed in higher crime rates, antisocial behaviour, family breakdown, and a general decline in the ethos of civility and community.

The conundrum for parties of the left, however, is that despite pervasive inequality, voters lack confidence in the state’s capacity to redistribute income and wealth. They have little faith that government programmes will genuinely improve the life chances of the poorest. The numbers who support government action to reduce the gap between rich and poor have actually declined in the last decade according to the BSA survey. Attitudes to those living in poverty also seem to have hardened, and there is little evidence of any robust commitment to an abstract ideal of equality.

Moreover, the spread of inequality is unlikely to recreate old forms of class warfare, nor should it tempt Labour to reclaim a mythical left identity. There is little appetite for the punitive confiscation of wealth – though there is scope for a credible debate about taxation and redistribution, particularly given recent controversies about the 10p tax band. What progressives need to recognise is the potentially contradictory impulses of the electorate. Voters increasingly turn to governments to protect them from the insecurities unleashed by globalisation. Yet they are ever more demanding of what the state can provide, suspicious of over-mighty centralism, and determined to exert their desire for greater choice and control.

To make further progress, an effective and popular approach to tackling inequality is needed that engages with the world voters inhabit. As the ippr have argued, the starting point should be framing arguments which bring to life the idea that we all stand to gain from a more equal society. The introduction of the minimum wage and tax credits has given a real boost to the low paid without costing jobs. The notion that people should be able to work hard and not end up in poverty strikes a chord with intuitive conceptions of fairness and justice. It also relates to the real impact of poverty and inequality in affecting people’s chances of succeeding at school, or being the victim of crime.

Aside from developing the arguments, progressives have to tap into issues where the growing gap between rich and poor already creates popular concern. There is widespread anxiety that society is pulling apart: excessive levels of boardroom pay, for example, offend popular conceptions of decency and moral desert. Social exclusion is increasingly marked, not only at the bottom where the poorest are cut off from the opportunities that society has to offer, but also the voluntary exclusion of the wealthy. The affluent withdraw from the public realm choosing to live in separate ‘gated’ enclaves.

Social and economic segregation prevents people from different backgrounds engaging with one another, and is antithetical to sustaining support for reducing poverty and inequality. There should be greater focus on how public spaces – schools, GP surgeries, Sure Start centres, mixed-tenure housing, local amenities – can help to bring people together.

New Labour has assumed too readily that Britain is a conservative country that will not wear change unless done by stealth. This has made it more difficult to tell a coherent political story, inhibiting it from engaging fully with rising inequality. The imperative is to take public attitudes seriously, building popular support for specific and credible measures in the world that the electorate actually inhabits.