Baroness Casey: “Don’t seek popularity in your approach – take responsibility”

At our recent President’s Dinner, Baroness Louise Casey of Blackstock DBE CB received CMI’s 2024 Lifetime Achievement Award. She met the occasion with typical irreverence.

Louise built her reputation by applying her strong voice to the social welfare sector. She was deputy director of Shelter, the homelessness charity, for seven years in the 1990s and worked on social welfare issues for five prime ministers across more than two decades. She became a crossbench peer in the House of Lords in September 2021. 

The new responsibilities keep coming. In February 2025, she was named the UK Government’s Lead Non-Executive Director and, in January 2025, announced as chair of an independent commission to find long-term and sustainable solutions for adult social care in England.

• Read more: Toasting trailblazers and transformation at the CMI President’s Dinner

Putting the ladder down

Through all those roles, Louise has proven to be a brilliant driver of change at the highest levels. The Lifetime Achievement Award recognises that tireless commitment, whether she was working to combat homelessness or advising the government on community cohesion in the face of extremism. 

The prize is clearly well deserved. But Louise was quick to shift the spotlight on to the women she credits with giving her a chance by “putting the ladder down” ahead of her. They include Melanie Richards, who appointed Louise to her first board role on a committee at KPMG. 

“It's incumbent on all of us,” said Louise. “Make sure you're always looking to the future and always pulling people up.”

As she received her prize, she was more than happy to share some other hard-won lessons. First, doing the difficult thing isn’t necessarily going to win you friends. She recalls being made Tony Blair’s “homelessness Tsar” in 1999, and said she “wasn’t the most popular Tsar in Whitehall”.

“They couldn’t wait for me to leave,” she told the President’s Dinner audience with a smile.

Be accountable, you can never blame other people or organisations. If you call yourself a manager or a leader, take responsibility

“I think the charities were exhausted by my relentlessness and my determination that we were going to get the most vulnerable off the streets. And my determination that we would count and audit. We worked out the long-term solutions to get people off the streets and we spent taxpayers’ money on drug, alcohol and mental health support for people, rather than just opening up beds.