On this day 20 years ago Britain's greatest living artist attended a fringe event hosted by Forest at the Labour Party conference in Brighton.

I’ve told the story before (several times!) but it was the best day of my working life so forgive me if I write about it again.

The previous year (2004) David Hockney had attended a private dinner hosted by Forest at Boisdale of Bishopsgate near the City of London. His appearance took us by surprise because he hadn’t replied to our invitation, which had been sent several weeks earlier, so we weren’t expecting him.

It turned out he hadn’t seen it because he had been abroad and only returned on the day of the dinner, whereupon he was met at the airport by his manager who handed him my letter, which had been faxed to him, and he came straight to the restaurant where eight or nine guests, including Oscar winning playwright Ronald Harwood (later Sir Ronald) and musician Joe Jackson, had just sat down to eat.

It was a wonderful evening but even I was surprised when, the following morning, Hockney told me it had been a “life-enhancing experience”. Furthermore, it had inspired him to write a letter to the Guardian (‘Smoking is my choice’).

Anyway, to cut a long story short, our fringe meeting at the 2005 Labour conference was, to the best of my knowledge, the first time Forest had ever organised an event at any party conference and we did it because, following the general election a few months earlier, we felt we had to take our campaign against the proposed smoking ban direct to the Labour Party which had just won its third successive victory under Tony Blair.

We booked a small room on the ground floor of the Metropole Hotel in Brighton, where most of the Cabinet were staying, and invited several speakers including Claire Fox (now Baroness Fox), Joe Jackson, and Sue Carroll, the much loved Daily Mirror columnist who died, sadly, in 2011.

Hockney let it be known he was interested in joining us but he couldn’t commit because the conference was at the tail-end of his annual holiday in the spa town of Baden-Baden in Germany. For that reason we couldn’t include his name in any promotional material in case it backfired on us.

Nevertheless, we left the invitation open and crossed our fingers. To be honest, I had almost given up hope but 48 hours before the event I got a message to say he would be returning from Baden-Baden the next day and was coming to Brighton. Cue pandemonium!

First we had to apply for a last minute conference pass. We also had to print new flyers announcing his presence, although I think we may have ordered them in advance, just in case. What I do remember is we had to recruit, at very short notice, a small team of students to distribute them to delegates.

Last but not least, we had to alert the media and, if I say so myself, we did a pretty good job because it’s easily the most successful event, in terms of publicity, Forest has ever organised, for which a great deal of the credit must go to the man himself.

*David Hockney in Brighton on September 28, 2005. Photo: Alamy*

First, there were back-to-back appearances on BBC Breakfast (where he held aloft a poster that read ‘Death awaits you even if you do not smoke’) and the Today programme (Radio 4) in which he upbraided a Labour Cabinet minister for being “dreary” and “boring” for supporting a workplace smoking ban. This led to reports on the BBC News website and elsewhere, and by the time he arrived in Brighton around lunchtime he was in even greater demand.

We had arranged a photo op at two o’clock at the Hilton Hotel which was outside the security zone and a bit further along the promenade. I anticipated a handful of photographers but what we got was around 20, all snapping away furiously when Hockney arrived.

But what also caught their attention was the appearance of Stuart Holmes, a long-time and somewhat eccentric anti-tobacco campaigner who had been ‘invited’ to the photo op by one of the photographers who thought it would be a good idea if Holmes stood alongside Hockney.

David didn’t mind at all, and stood there smiling, if a trifle bemused. The hotel management, however, took a different view and several members of staff dragged Holmes out of the room via a fire exit. This was all caught on camera and the photographers present couldn’t believe their luck!

Meanwhile the BBC wanted Andrew Neil to interview Hockney live as part of their conference coverage and I remember walking him from the Hilton to the BBC studio within the conference centre which was easier said than done because it was quite difficult to find and we only just made it on time.

At the same time we were fielding other media requests. One-to-one interviews had been requested by the Press Association, the Independent, Telegraph, and Guardian, and they all had to be squeezed into the time available before our fringe meeting began at 5.00pm.

As I say, it was a small room but that worked in our favour because every seat was taken and others had to stand or sit on the floor. Many more were left standing outside. The atmosphere was brilliant but what I remember most is the laughter.

After the meeting finished we took our speakers, including Hockney, and a handful of other guests, to Havana, a Cuban-themed restaurant in the centre of Brighton. I think there were a dozen of us and we were given a private area at the back of the restaurant. One of the guests, a journalist, was a last minute arrival who had been sent by the Sunday Times to interview Hockney so we sat them next to one another. The result was a slightly barbed two or three page feature in the next edition. (And, no, I haven’t forgotten the name of the journalist.)

One by one, our guests gradually left. Hockney caught the train back to London and, eventually, I returned to my hotel. It was past midnight and I remember walking along the promenade when the heavens opened and the rain came down so hard it was bouncing off the pavement. I was completely soaked and when I got back to my hotel room I had to peel off my suit and leave it in the bath to dry.

But how I laughed. It was that sort of day.

PS. David subsequently attended several more Forest events, including a party at Boisdale of Belgravia in 2008, and a reception on the terrace of the House of Commons in 2011. Nothing, however, will ever beat that day in Brighton.

On this day … 20 years ago

Life’s a beach