My work experience with Bobby Dean
by Aarav Patel
My Work Experience with Bobby Dean and his team has been an eye-opening experience from learning different transferable skills to the ins and outs of working in an MP’s environment and daily challenges it comes with.
Unlike my other work experiences, I have been able to take part and effectively learn how an MP's office is run , the inside components on how an MP office is run and how working in politics can be used to help shape communities and attend to the needs of all constituents.
The first day I did admin and media and it was nothing like the assumptions I had in my head. The team here works especially hard and Bobby Dean is at the heart of that with his schedule being packed full of meetings, votes and Treasury Committee meetings. Not only that but he still finds the time in the small gaps of free time he has to go through all of the emails received and listen to all of his constituents which is something the most MP’s don't normally do.
Through the admin side of the work , i have learnt how to effectively manage, organise and create our own action plan for an issue in an area of concern to us , i personally did my own action plan on green spaces and open areas and how to improve green areas or transform brownfield sites into newer greener spaces to help the local community especially during the summer heatwaves, and being given this opportunity to help propose and plan an action to help the local community has really opened my eyes into the how a MP’s office manages day to day requests and how they plan for the future.
Through the media side of the work, I watched , as a part of my task , the treasury committee meeting that was held on the 30th of June. This meeting discussed and scruntised the HMRC tax code and through this as a part of my task was to create a press release and a social media post on this topic. The press release taught me the importance of political communication between MPs , Westminster , journalists and many other stakeholders and the ability to have strong connections between the MP and constituents and the social media task taught me you always in to plan ideas and discuss them before publishing them out into the world for everyone to see and also it taught me to be specific and and too find relevant examples to match the post’s ideas so the viewer does not get confused or overwhelmed with information when watching.
On my second day, I was taught by the casework team who deal with all emails that are sent from the MP office. It was really great to see how passionate and caring the team were about making sure that each constituent feels heard and gets the best response to their questions. They talked us through how casework is divided into personal, policy and campaign and educated me on the extent of the variety that they help with. From helping with housing issues and homelessness to immigration problems and concerns and benefit concerns.
This part of my work experience was very interesting to me as without this work experience I would have not known the range of problems that people email Bobby Dean about on a day to day basis. As well as , through this work experience I was able to grasp the sheer level of work the casework team has to deal with and respond to on a day to day basis. As one of the caseworkers said to me, ‘No two days will ever be the same,’ and through this I was able to understand the level of effort and dedication they have to aid people's problems.
On my third day, I was lucky enough to be taken to parliament for the day. As part of our day I was given a tour of parliament , being able to see the house of commons and lords and being able to access where the MPs have their committee meetings is very fascinating to me. As well as , being able to see the historical paintings and art work of previous prime ministers and monarchs showed me how much our country and our parliamentary system has changed over the centuries and how much we evolved.
I then was able to draft up a potential private members bill that Bobby Dean could put forward that was about ‘Restricting AI usage in schools and educating pupils and teachers on AI.’ Doing the research for this topic opened my eyes into the life of a parliamentary researcher and day to day roles and their impact in an MP’s office.
On my final day, we did policy casework where I had to draft a response to someone asking about Bobby Dean's perspective and personal policy on the topic of the assisted dying bill. This was interesting as I am not educated on this topic and so had to put in a lot of research into assisted dying and the Lib Dems policies and party lines. This taught me a lot about how to respond to emails in different situations as unlike the personal casework/emails I had drafted on my second day, the policy casework needed a different tone and it also taught me how to structure my emails into a professional and blunt tone.
During this work experience, I had a lot of fun despite having to deal with countless amounts of technical wording and being confronted with issues and problems I had no knowledge on.The team here was extremely supportive and gave feedback every step of the way to make sure I received as much as I could out of the experience and felt encouraged to pursue more of this work in the future.
The feedback is also something that I will be able to leave very satisfied with as it made a lasting impact on how I take on tasks and think through my reasoning. This is key especially when writing emails as I have to be aware of everyone's situation and balance what I say carefully so that each constituent receives an adequate response that they can walk away feeling fulfilled.
Being able to see a week into Bobby Dean’s life and work , I have grown and have been able to experience what many can't and I will always be forever grateful for this experience and being able to work and adapt to different working environments to be able to respond to different organisations and use a variety of different tones has showed me how to work effectively in a professional and well respected environment surrounded by workers who know what their doing and how to maximise their utility, all while being able to have fun and have a laugh.
Overall, this placement has left me feeling extremely fulfilled and encouraged to pursue the political career path further and this work experience has actually opened my eyes into the different career paths that I can take. I have met so many wonderful people that have been so supportive the whole time and very patient with me and I feel truly grateful to be given such an amazing opportunity and the ability to meet new people with so many different political backgrounds has inspired me to branch out and find out and explore different political careers other than those from inside parliament. So, a big thank you to MP Bobby Dean and the whole team for having me. To anyone who wishes to do a work experience placement here I would highly recommend this work experience as I have had such a lovely time and learnt so much.
