Opposing View: Political Party Conferences – what’s the point?

​And hardly any ordinary party members, or for that matter even MPs, even turn up to them these days. And yet over the years the media spectacle continues.

From a former Labour Party leader’s hilarious pratfall in the Brighton surf, through a succession of failed former Tory Party leaders’ on-stage dancing and propaganda, followed by the widely reported efforts of a former Peterborough council leader failing to physically remove a small banner from two young women protesters in the audience.

For those at the very top of the tree (the leader and entourage), a conference presents one big media opportunity – made special by the fact that the parties have an unspoken pact with each other to give others a free run. That opportunity is capped of course by the Party leader’s speech – a way to rally the devoted attendees, convince the journalists (and through them you folks at home) that they, and not their opponent, has what it takes.

For the vast majority like you and me who don’t go (and in my case have never been) to a Party conference and who pay little attention, then, they may as well not take place. But for those who attend, they fulfil a whole bunch of functions. Certainly, with the odd exception, they leave pretty much everyone there feeling good about themselves, and maybe, in the grand scheme of things and in an otherwise cynical world, that’s often no mean feat.

The Lib Dems’ are in Brighton as I write, no doubt celebrating their electoral gains. Labour, similarly, will be in Liverpool next week on post-Election cloud nine, with the Tories the week after in Birmingham, although possibly occupying a smaller room than normal, horse-trading and scheming over which poor soul will be their next temporary leader. Presumably, then, there must still be a point to them.

In fact, there are several. For at least some of the parties, they may well be money-spinners. Which explains why so many of those attending these days work for pressure groups and lobbyists. These people are paying top dollar to attend and then more if they want a stand in one of the exhibition areas, where they are joined by retailers selling books, jewellery, clothes, trinkets and tat, companies flogging their services and caterers providing the ubiquitous refreshments at commercially-sponsored fringe meetings.

Most political discussion takes place in a bubble, its normally self- absorbed participants more or less uncontaminated by the real world you and I live in. These discussions tend towards the abstract and unclear. Layers of metaphor and tactical thinking are piled one on top of each other, until the original issue at stake is pretty-much lost underneath all that cleverness.

For normal folk it sounds impenetrable, like a different language. And that is a huge problem for the senior members of political parties and their followers in the practice of politics. Most speeches or interviews given by local and national politicians are attempts to translate the results of all that abstract and tactical thinking back into the language of everyday life. But it is not at all easy to do this, and most fail because they’re hindered by that self-interest and don’t understand what normal residents/voters want.

When you turn on the radio or the TV, you know instantly if it is a politician speaking. They will be using that unmistakable tone and vocabulary. It is the sound of someone trying to present the results of a whole lot of intellectual contortions as something like ordinary speech. So, when ordinary speech does, in fact, intrude into the political bubble, it can be very effective.

That’s why we Independent Peterborough First members talk the language our residents understand. We know most residents and taxpayers of Peterborough are fed up with the old politically misleading propaganda and distorted rhetoric about other groups.

You showed us at May’s local elections just how fed up you were with over 20 years of Conservative self-interest and the one-term Conservative MP; electing Peterborough First to win every seat we contested.

The Peterborough First conference happens in our wards, villages and on the streets of Peterborough. This is where we speak with real people like you and where we listen and respond to the things that matter to our residents. A Peterborough-focused group of Councillors who are listening and talking locally, not congratulating themselves in conference halls miles away.