Sheila Jones - "The Labour Party Conference From The Outside"

This is the text of a talk given by Heaton & Lostock Branch member Sheila Jones at the Party meeting on 3rd December 2003.

Sheila said that she had attended the Party conference for the last 10 years but not as a delegate. She said that she goes as a guest, mainly to attend the fringe meetings. She first went to a British Dental Association fringe meeting at Blackpool in a room next door to another meeting being addressed by Arthur Scargill. She had initially thought that all the people heading towards the room were going to the BDA meeting but were, of course, going to hear the ex-miners' leader!

She became involved because of the fluoridation issue and started going each year to lobby the conference. She found the breadth of discussion and atmosphere around the conference to be very stimulating.

At the 2003 Conference she had concentrated on health issues and there had been a lot of "health events" amongst the fringe meetings, some hosted by the drugs companies. At these meetings you get a chance to mix with and talk to ministers face to face. As a result she has built up quite a lot of relationships with Labour people in the health network.

One of the other fascinating areas of the conference fringe is the breadth of a lot of the discussion about the history of our movement, especially the meetings organised by the Labour Historical Society. Some very high profile speakers address their meetings, for example, in 2003 Robin Cooke talked about historical figures in the Party.

Sheila said that any Labour Party member can go to the conference as an observer. You just have to register for about £27 for the week and you can attend everything, although, of course, you cannot access the conference floor itself. Anyone who is interested just has to phone Party HQ to get the form.

Sheila's final comment on the conference was that, because of issues such as Iraq, Foundation Hospitals and University top up fees the media wanted a bloodbath. But the conference wasn't going to let it happen - and didn't!

Sheila's talk was followed by a general discussion and then a wonderful Christmas buffet provided mainly by Joyce and Alan.

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