In 1907 he was elected to the London County Council as a Municipal Reformer. From 1918-1919 he served as chairman and was an Alderman of the council from 1922-1934. He served as the vice-chairman of the National Trust during the 1930s, but he declined the chairmanship, because he was not "a great landowner". He placed the Trust's finance committee on a more professional footing; it subsequently fell to his son Mark Norman to chair that committee through the difficult economic circumstances of the 1970s. From 1933 to 1935 he served as vice-chairman of the BBC, and was chairman from 1935 to April, 1939.