Hard Labour

With the Labour Party conference taking place in Liverpool this week, I’m reminded of a fringe event, hosted by Forest and the Working Men’s Club and Institute Union (CIU), that took place in the city exactly 15 years ago.

Organised to promote the Save Our Pubs & Clubs campaign, we joined forces with the CIU because we knew that hosting an event under the Forest banner was unlikely to attract a large number of Labour delegates, especially if the party declined to include the event in its fringe listings, which is what happened in Manchester the previous year.

Determined to overcome such petty obstructionism, in 2011 we looked for an attractive venue and booked the Cavern Club, a faithful reproduction of the original brick-vaulted cellar where The Beatles played in the early Sixties. The current club shares some of the original club’s footprint, plus there’s a larger ‘Live Lounge’ that can be hired for private events.

It proved the perfect choice, and here’s how I described what turned out to be one of our most successful and enjoyable party conference events:

A trickle of guests became a flood as over 200 people attended last night's Save Our Pubs & Clubs event at the Cavern Club in Liverpool.

The event began with a 50-minute DVD of Paul McCartney playing at the club in 1999. It was projected on to the large video wall at the back of the stage. The volume was low enough to allow people to talk but it established the perfect atmosphere.

Then it was time for the speeches. I escorted our speakers backstage and we walked on stage from the wings.

First, I introduced former pub landlord Nick Hogan (above), well known to readers of this blog. Nick said a few words before I introduced John Tobin, vice president of the Clubs & Institute Union, who said a few more. Both speakers caught the mood of the audience and their (short) speeches were received with cheers and applause.

Highlight of the evening was the Beatles tribute band who played for 60 minutes and were great value for money. Made In Liverpool were genuinely very, very good and the bass player was the spitting image of McCartney. (Unfortunately the illusion was lost when I visited the band in their dressing room and saw them without their wigs!)

Anyway, they got a great reception, including a standing ovation at the end. Songs included 'A Hard Day's Night', 'I Feel Fine', 'Girl', 'Eight Days A Week', 'Twist and Shout' and many more.

Three months ago Dave Jones, owner of the Cavern Club, assured me that an event like this would be a great success. I was keen to do it but with our record at Labour conference I wasn't convinced we would attract a large crowd.

I needn’t have worried because Dave was right. We had a capacity audience who not only enjoyed themselves enormously but went home with a serious message (and some great music) ringing in their ears.

Guests included Michael Dugher MP, PPS to Leader of the Opposition Ed Miliband. Dougher not only stayed to the end but on his way out I heard him say, “That was the best event at the Labour conference”.

Five Live Breakfast presenter Nicky Campbell was there too, interviewing guests for the following morning's programme.

Sadly, we’ve never been able to replicate the success of that event at subsequent Labour conferences, and several years ago we took the decision that it was worth neither our time or our money to try. Nevertheless we’ll always have Brighton 2005 and Liverpool 2011 to look back on, so I’m grateful for that.