It is with great sadness that we recently learned that Hywel Lloyd, former Chair of SERA, has died. He will be remembered by many in SERA, the wider Labour movement and environmental politics, for his wisdom, generosity, warmth and deep commitment to finding practical ways of putting environmental concerns at the heart of progressive politics. But most of all, many of us will miss him as a wonderful and kind friend.
I first met Hywel in the early 2000s, when I was a young councillor taking part in the IDEA Leadership Academy, which he had helped to establish and deliver. Hywel taught me that leadership did not have to look one particular way, showing me how different approaches could help me bring about the changes my council needed in order for politics to deliver for the community in I represented. From that first meeting, he remained a friend, mentor and trusted source of advice and wisdom.
That was characteristic of Hywel. He had an extraordinary ability to combine a deep commitment to his principles with a pragmatic understanding of how change actually happens. He was generous with his knowledge and experience, never pushy but always willing to offer advice and support that was thoughtful, occasionally challenging, and invariably useful. I am sure I am not the only one to say that I honestly don’t know how I will manage without his sage advice.
Born in 1964 to Welsh parents, Hywel studied chemistry at the University of Bath, where he became president of the students’ union. His subsequent career took him into policy, politics and environmental work. He served as a Specialist Policy Adviser to Hazel Blears and Hilary Benn, when they were ministers at the Department for Communities and Local Government and Defra. He worked on issues including climate-change mitigation and adaptation, Zero Carbon Homes, Eco-Towns, planning, energy and resources.
Hywel took a distinctive role within the environmental movement. He combined a strong commitment to the natural environment, with a keen interest in politics, public policy and the institutions through which change could actually be achieved. He understood that environmental questions could not be separated from questions of social justice, democracy and how we organise our communities – particularly the sense of place. Hywel brought that combination of environmental commitment and practical policy thinking to his work with SERA. As Co-Chair from 2003-2007, he helped to make the case that environmentalism should not be treated as an issue separate from the wider Labour political project. Climate change, energy, land use, resources and sustainability were questions about the kind of society we wanted to build, and therefore questions at the heart of progressive politics.
I was particularly honoured to later follow in Hywel’s footsteps as Co-Chair of SERA. It was a role that was made considerably easier by knowing that Hywel was still nearby. Whenever I found myself facing a dilemma or a problem I couldn’t quite see the answer to, I knew I could turn to him for wise input. He never seemed to lose his ability to see the bigger picture, while also understanding the practical detail that stood between an idea and making it happen.
That combination was perhaps perfectly demonstrated in one of Hywel’s most enduring SERA legacies – the SERA anniversary woods. Hywel came up with the idea of working with the Woodland Trust so that SERA members could purchase individual trees and, collectively, create a forest. It was exactly the sort of idea that captured his approach to environmental politics – practical, collective and designed to leave something behind for the future. He was also, however, determined to see the idea through. This was despite the rather less romantic reality that buying hundreds of individual trees meant hundreds of small cheques to be logged and processed. Both Emma Burnell, who was National Organiser before me, and I made our feelings about this administrative burden known to Hywel with some force. He remained entirely unmoved. The woods were a wonderful idea, and therefore, in Hywel’s mind, the woods were going to happen – and indeed still grows.
The SERA woods captures something important about Hywel. He believed in ideas, but he also believed that ideas mattered only if you were prepared to do the work of making them real. He was an optimist, but a practical one. He understood the compromises and frustrations of politics without becoming cynical about its possibilities.
His contribution to the environment movement extended well beyond SERA. Through his subsequent work setting up Labour Coast and Country, and on local government, energy, sustainability and environmental policy, through organisations such as UK100, he continued to work on the connections between environmental sustainability, democratic governance and the places in which people live.
But for those of us who knew him, Hywel’s importance cannot be captured by a list of positions or policy achievements. Because he was a rare politician who didn’t seek the spotlight for himself, but made quiet – yet nevertheless great – contributions by helping other people to navigate politics, encouraging them to believe that things could be done differently, and being there with a calm word of advice when they inevitably encountered a difficult moment.
For me, Hywel was a friend, mentor and source of wisdom for many years. He was lovely company and someone I looked forward to running into at SERA events, Labour Conference, and most recently at this summer’s Hay Festival. I feel enormously fortunate to have known him. He will be greatly missed by his friends, colleagues and all those in the Labour and environmental movements whose lives and work he touched. His commitment to a more sustainable, democratic and socially just future lives on in the people he mentored, the organisations he strengthened, the ideas he championed – and, quite literally, in the trees he planted. They will stand as a fitting legacy: Hundreds of individual contributions, brought together to create something larger than any one person could have made alone. That feels very much like Hywel.
Melanie Smallman, SERA Executive Member and former Co-Chair