I sat on the Federal Conference Committee (FCC) for several years – which I thoroughly enjoyed – and like most newbies I asked questions about the venues we used. Why do we seem to rotate the Autumn Conference between two towns on the south coast? What about other places further north with good Conference facilities? The reasons soon became apparent.
FCC does look at as many potential Conference venues as possible, and in the end it comes down to two things – facilities and cost.
Nick da Costa is the current Chair of FCC and he is regularly asked the same questions by members, so he has published a paper that breaks down the issues in some details. You can read it here. It is rather long, and includes some useful tables and charts, but here are some extracts:
The Conference Office and FCC regularly review future venues; this is an iterative process, and we regularly review over 40 venues in relation to costs, suitability and availability. We have looked at venues in Scotland, Wales and in England, and continually try to identify new opportunities.
In many cases, unfortunately, the venues are simply either far too expensive for our budget, or are simply not suitable for our requirements.
For example –
- Lack sufficient accessible fringe space
- Lack a suitable conference hotel within easy reach of the main conference venue
- Have insufficient back of house space for the many staff and volunteers who make Conference happen and contribute to its success
- Too expensive
- Unsatisfactory transport links
The document goes on to list the requirements in more detail.
Many Universities could be suitable but they are never available at Conference time. Holiday resorts, such as Butlins, tend to be too small for Autumn but too large for Spring Conference – and we would have to book the whole site.
Over the last 20 years, outside Coalition, Autumn Conference has been held in Brighton or Bournemouth, apart from one year in Blackpool. As a matter of principal if the Autumn Conference is in the south then the Spring one will always be in the north, and vice versa.
During the Coalition years more funding was available from the Home Office for security costs so we were able to use other venues, such as Liverpool (my favourite) and Glasgow.
If you think you know a venue that might work for either Spring or Autumn then Nick suggests:
The most helpful thing you can do is find out whether your council, BID or other interested party can provide a financial incentive for our Conferences to be staged with them – we know that our conferences bring considerable positive economic impact to the city or town we visit.
Looking ahead, Spring Conference 2025 will be back in Harrogate from 21st to 23rd March. You can find details here and registration will open at the end of November. It has just been announced that Autumn Conference 2025 will take place in Bournemouth from 20th to 25th September.
* Mary Reid is a contributing editor on Lib Dem Voice. She was a councillor in Kingston upon Thames, where she is still very active with the local party, and is the Hon President of Kingston Lib Dems.
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7 Comments
I have to say that the idea that Harrogate is in ‘the North’ is quite a stretch. Even just considering the mainland of Great Britain, Harrogate is just 255 miles from Southampton on the English Channel but 455 miles from Thurso at the northern end of Great Britain.
Harrogate is easily – by some 100 miles – in the southern half of the United Kingdom.
@Mary Fulton I think you need a way of defining north and south which depends more of where people actually live rather than linear distance.
In 30 odd years of attending federal conference, I’ve been to Glasgow, Edinburgh, Newcastle-upon-Tyne, Scarborough, Harrogate, York, Blackpool, Manchester, Nottingham, Birmingham, Brighton, Bournemouth, Torquay and Plymouth.
Traditionally party conferences were held in seaside resorts which valued prolonging their season. These places often relied on Victorian built hotels to provide rooms for fringes etc. These rooms were often accessed only by stairs and were rightly criticised for lack of access for less mobile members. Other issues will include size of venue and cost. I hope and believe that these are among the issues that FCC consider.
The other point about seaside resorts is – with conference taking place just after the main tourist season B&B providers can accomodate attendees.
This is a serious issue as the permanent siting of the main party conference on the south coast skews the representation of members and , as a consequence, the votes on key policy debates. It is hard to argue that conference democratically makes genuine party policy when members from Scotland and the North of England are permanently under-represented.
For myself, I simply cannot afford the cost of the Autumn conference any more. If as Nick da Costa states, there is no viable venue in the North of England, then at least the party should consider mitigating the cost by having differential rates for registration etc. The Liberal Party always had a pooled fares system for its committees etc and to do something similar for the main annual conference would be a Liberal act, even if only a token benefit.
Michael Meadowcroft is absolutely correct when he says, “the south coast skews the representation of members and , as a consequence, the votes on key policy debates”.
The focus and attention the current Lib Dem party gives to the so-called ‘blue wall’ and to the prosperous Home Counties skews its identity as a truly UK party – and will impact on the long term future of the party when the inevitable Tory recovery occurs – as it always does. If the party is to be seen as a truly national party representing the whole of the UK then it should ensure that it is seen to be interested and effective way beyond the South Coast of England.
Johnson got a great number of things wrong……. and never did much about the few things that he got right…….. but……. his raising of the issue of ‘levelling up’ was right. It had echoes that Michael will recognise of our old Leader Jo Grimond’s championing of regionalism. These things are, and do get noticed.
For what it’s worth, the centre of population of Great Britain is somewhere between Birmingham and Leicester.