It’s that time of year when the air turns crisp, the leaves brown, and thoughts turn to conference. For Labour, conference (always without the definite article) brings together the labour tribes to the banks of the Mersey. 

For many, it is an eagerly-awaited fixed point in the calendar like Wimbledon, the Boat Race, or Glastonbury Festival. For some, especially constituency delegates, it is their first experience of conference. It can be a bewildering and frustrating experience. Here, then, are some tips on surviving conference.

1. It’s all about shoes. Yes, you’ll need your Conference Guide, CAC reports, card vote, and of course your conference credential. But without the right shoes, you will be sunk. Conference involves a great deal of standing and even more walking. You’ll cover hundreds of steps within the conference centre, and even more along the waterfront from fringe to fringe. A glance at the map tells you that your week will be punctuated by brisk 25-minute walks, often in sheeting rain and gales straight off the river. You need the kind of shoe that can take the punishment. Now is not the time for formality or fashion. Leave the heels and pack the Gazelles.
2. Decide what you want to do in advance. There are thousands of events and you can’t do them all. Older readers may recall the arrival of the Christmas Radio Times, and circling the TV programmes you wanted to watch. I suggest you do something similar with the Conference Guide on the train to Lime Street. As well as the set-piece Cabinet speeches, and the Leader’s Speech (historically billed as the ‘Parliamentary Report’) we have the bonus of a deputy leadership hustings on Wednesday. Then there will be debates you need to attend and report back to your CLP. You can probably attend three or four fringes or receptions per day. So choose wisely, and focus your efforts, or else you will be spending your time racing from the end of one meeting to the start of the next and missing the thing you most wanted to do.
3. Hit the Pullman. Every year, there is a ‘conference hotel’. This is the hotel reserved for important figures such as NEC members and senior HQ staff. Mere Cabinet ministers must make do with AirBnB. As the fringes and receptions wind up late at night, those in the know gravitate to the bar. Here you can rub shoulders with political celebrities, broadcasting legends, and trade union barons. There’s an air of democracy in the Pullman, as the normal constraints of status fall away. A selfie with Bridget? No problem. A joke with Keir? Of course. At the conference hotel, we are all comrades. Although the drinks prices are distinctly capitalist.
4. It’s not Freshers’ Week. The real cognoscenti arrive on Saturday, and the first receptions are on Saturday night. From then onwards, there are ceaseless opportunities for drinking, eating, carousing and general merriment. The best fringes have free food and drink. There’s a bar on every corner. So the best advice is to take it easy, remember you’re not as young as you were, and this is not Fresher’s Week. Some veterans even mark out an ‘early night’ which may mean bed before 3am. Alas, every year there are those who can’t handle the pace and disgrace themselves, including MPs and ministers. Hard to believe, I know.
5. Walls have ears. We focus on our shindig in Liverpool, but of course we are part of a conference season, starting with Reform, then Lib Dems, then us, then the Tories. The Greens may also have some kind of happening in a yurt or something. So there’s an enormous travelling circus of lobbyists, exhibitors, commercial visitors, and journalists who have to do a month of conferences. Journalists are the ones to worry about. Our friends in the fourth estate are not there for fun. They are there for stories. They hang about in the bars and fringe meetings, hoping for indiscretions and gossip. They want constituency delegates to do vox pops on the leader’s speech or what Rachel said or how the hustings went. And guess what, they don’t want supportive and loyal quotes. They want juicy denunciations and counsels of despair. Don’t give them the satisfaction.
6. Build your network. In the olden days, you might return from Brighton or Blackpool with a suitcase full of business cards and beermats with scribbled names and numbers. Then the fun task of matching names, numbers, and half-remembered conversations at the Fabian fringe meeting on pensions or the Labour Animal Welfare Society karaoke. Today, few have cards, but everyone has LinkedIn. So build your network. Take pictures of people’s conference passes if that helps. Start with people from your region, or from the same affiliate or union, and build outwards. There’s only about a thousand people in politics, and eventually we all meet each other. And you never know when that contact might come in handy as selections season looms.
7. Read all about it. There’s a curious phenomenon at conference, which is the media reporting about conference bears little or no relation to the conference you are at. If you dip into the news media, you will read about furious rows on conference floor, what Rachel said in her big Today Programme interview, what colour socks McSweeney was wearing, sightings of Sultana, Abbott, or Polanski at the World Transformed, or the big stunt that Reform UK will pull to derail Starmer’s speech. None of which impinges on the consciousness of the delegates on the conference floor. You’ll get messages from friends at home saying ‘oooh what about that thing that person said’ and you will have no idea what they are talking about. So heads down, focus on the debates and policy making, enjoy the speeches, make friends, and don’t worry about what it says in the Daily Mail or on GB News. That’s Tim Allen’s job.
8. Speak up. The final piece of advice is to try to speak at conference. Choose an unpopular debate to increase your chances, and make yourself known to the chair or party staff. Write a pithy two-minutes of material. Check your trousers are done up or there’s no lippy on your teeth. And wave your CAC report like your life depends on it. If called, you’ll confront the blistering lights and hundreds of faces, and your heart will pound in your chest. Make your points, and sit down. And it will be one of the most exhilarating experiences of your life, like bungee jumping or parachuting but with added standing orders. The first time I addressed conference I was the warm-up for Barbara Castle, under the watchful gaze of Neil Kinnock and Roy Hattersley. The next time was 30 years later, so if you get the chance, take it.

Paul Richards has attended 35 Labour Party conferences as candidate, special adviser, visitor, speechwriter, party staffer, and CLP delegate.