Local Councils to National Policy: Reflections from Abdul Hai OBE’s Masterclass on Community-Centric Governance

Hugh has worked in a number of inner-city London schools, and for the last three years as a secondary school History teacher. He volunteers as an Ambassador In Policy for the charity Teach First, and most recently, has completed his MA in Education, Policy and Society from King’s College London. Hugh is involved in public policy research, is a member of the Young Fabians, and has a strong academic interest in the politics of the populist radical right, democratic backsliding, and constitutional reform.

Every Patchwork Masterclass offers a unique insight into a specific aspect of British political life, and the session with Abdul Hai OBE was no different focusing on the unique and vital roles that local councils play in the lives of citizens.  

During my undergraduate studies, I worked for Exeter City Council and was exposed to the central role that councils play as community hubs and local service providers. After returning to London to teach in inner-city schools and through my broader activism, I noticed that many London communities and young people can often feel disconnected from their political representatives, in local and central government, despite being geographically close to these institutions. In this light, Mr. Hai’s Masterclass was particularly illuminating, as it reiterated the important yet sometimes overlooked role that councils play in fostering a sense of belonging, connecting individuals and communities to their local areas.  

Mr Hai’s commitment to community service is illustrated through his advocacy for the London Borough of Camden, serving sixteen years as a councillor from 2006 to 2022, including a decade as a cabinet member. His commitment to youth services and local communities earned him an OBE in 2022. With over twenty-four years in the Labour Party, Abdul continues to advocate for his community and progressive politics as Vice Chair of SME4Labour, supporting small and medium-sized enterprises across the UK; and as Director of Community Relations and Public Affairs at LabTech, such as working with Patchwork to sponsor the LabTech Community Champion Award which recognises those who have made significant contributions to their local communities.

From the discussions and conversations from the Masterclass, I will outline key learnings and insights that personally resonated with me:  

Firstly, the Masterclass underscored that political challenges should not always be about directly confronting your adversaries. Instead, coalition building can be effective in achieving political goals. It was insightful to consider how opposition, whether from within the council or the local community, can often aid policymakers to refine, modify and improve decisions that ultimately result in better policy implementation. 

Mr Hai emphasised that leadership requires you to be the change you want to see, highlighting the necessity of personal initiative, and throwing yourself into the public realm to ensure that your values are represented. This affirms Patchwork’s #GetInvolved initiative which focuses on getting young people more involved with grassroot politics. This led to a discussion about the importance of integrity in leadership. Mr. Hai stressed that integrity fosters confidence in leaders and ensures accountability by ensuring their actions align with their values, going beyond mere words and rhetoric. 

Mr Hai noted that local council politics is a useful breeding ground for learning to gain hands-on experience, before making the jump to national politics. Rather than viewing politics as a restricted club, local council involvement can provide people with a more accessible entry route to public life. In this sense, fostering an opportunity for inclusion rather than exclusion. Secondly, as a breeding ground for learning local councils like Camden have played important roles in developing policy innovations that are then scaled to the national level in the form of policy borrowing. For example, Camden Council’s corporate plan locally has arguably played a key role in inspiring the Labour government’s National Wealth Fund, a £7.3 billion initiative launched on 9th July 2024, to boost growth and unlock investment nationally. Also from a more holistic perspective, Camden Council’s goal setting approach to local governance mirrors the Labour government’s “mission-driven” approach from Whitehall. These two examples demonstrating how local initiatives, once proven effective, can be adapted and then implemented at the national level.

Lastly, I would like to end reflecting on a conception of what success meant to Mr Hai as a public servant which I found both novel and inspiring. For him, success should be measured not just by personal achievements but by your altruistic contributions—”not by what you achieve, but by what you give”, and that while public service often involves setbacks, these can often offer opportunities for reflection and growth. 

In this spirit, I look forward to implementing the reflections and insights gained from the Masterclass into my personal and professional life in politics and I hope my other Patchwork colleagues found the Masterclass as motivating as I did.