They are called party conferences for a reason. The endless stream of soirées and social gatherings around the annual Conservative and Labour members’ jamborees are where the real business of a British political conference takes place. The gossiping, networking, building of alliances and seeding of feuds; it all happens amid the heaving masses of politicians, diplomats, journalists and other hangers-on who twirl and clink their way through this crazy kaleidoscope of lubricated side events.
The evening social gatherings at last week’s Tory conference in Manchester and this week’s Labour event in Liverpool are also the clearest bellwether yet of the contrasting moods between Britain’s two largest political parties in advance of next year’s election. The difference in atmosphere was stark between the Tories, furtive and somewhat subdued, and Labour, bullish amid the scent of victory.
The Conservative party’s conference was held in a secure zone in the city centre surrounded by police vans and machine-gun toting officers. There was no shortage of relatively lively parties to attend in and around the secure zone in the evenings. But you had to walk only about 200m from the conference zone to find that the atmosphere had dropped to zero.
The surrounding streets were deserted. Party members kept a fairly low profile. The entire affair seemed to be enveloped by the foreboding sense of something ending, rather than the hope of a new beginning.
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The difference in mood at Labour’s conference was striking. To an outsider’s eye, Liverpool may be a livelier city than Manchester anyway. But walking through its city centre streets on Sunday night at the end of the first full day of the conference, the place was in full swing. Restaurants and bars were full, spilling revellers on to the streets.
The Irish influence on Liverpool was also far more overt compared with Manchester. Every second pub in Liverpool city centre seemed to fly the tricolour, as patrons packed inside.
Among the go-to conference parties on Sunday night was the gathering of Woburn Partners, a communications and lobbying firm run by James Robinson, a former journalist and one-time adviser to the Labour Party’s former deputy leader, Tom Watson.
The event was jam-packed with the elite of the British media scene, such as Sky political broadcaster Sophy Ridge and the Westminster journalists of all the big newspapers – the Times, the Telegraph, the Guardian and the Financial Times. It was also full with lobbyists, business figures and diplomats. Music pounded. Flaming cocktails lit up the room, their sweet, scorched scent filling the air. Among the Labour people present, there was clearly a sense that they felt they were coming over the hill.
The crowd swelled in size, drawn in by boxes of Tayto crisps (to the bewilderment of the many foreign guests) and yet another elaborate free bar
Many party members in Liverpool this week tried weakly to temper talk that they are on course for victory in next year’s election. But, again, the mood at their parties betrayed them.
Monday night was Irish night. Early in the evening, the Irish embassy hosted a lively and well-attended event at the Hilton Hotel, near the docklands conference venue. Irish ambassador Martin Fraser and shadow Northern Ireland Secretary Hilary Benn gave speeches about the importance of protecting the Belfast Agreement and the contribution of the Irish community to Liverpool, and to Britain. Around the room, the talk was of the election.
Immediately afterwards at the same hotel, the Labour Party’s Irish Society, chaired by Liam Conlon, the son of Sue Gray, who is chief of staff to Labour leader Keir Starmer, held its annual conference gathering. At the conclusion of the embassy’s bash, much of the crowd simply moved from one event to the other. Then the crowd swelled in size, drawn in by boxes of Tayto crisps (to the bewilderment of the many foreign guests) and yet another elaborate free bar.
As the evening wore on, the atmosphere among the Labour people present drifted into a near celebratory mood. Fraser and Benn addressed the crowd again, along with others including Irish Labour leader Ivana Bacik, Conlon, Sadiq Khan, the mayor of London, and Michael Shanks, the newly minted Labour MP for Rutherglen and Hamilton West on the southern edge of Glasgow.
Labour recorded a crushing byelection victory over the SNP in Rutherglen last week that has burnished the party’s hopes of revival in Scotland. That would grease Starmer’s way to Downing Street. It certainly boosted the atmosphere at the party’s conference this week.
As the event heaved to a conclusion, a senior Irish figure present leant towards to me as we both surveyed the room, which by now resembled a huge residents’ bar at a boisterous Irish wedding. “This is Irish soft power in action,” he said, as luminaries from the party that might well form the next British government milled around the room.
The two main party conferences are over. The election fight will soon begin.