So it appears that some people (probably based in the south) have considered that having a full day Saturday and ending Autumn Conference on a Tuesday is going to safe people money on accommodation. As someone who many times has travelled from the northern reaches to the southern coast I beg to disagree.
Travelling from Scotland or locations up north the later start on the Saturday often allowed people the option of travelling on the first train or plane in the morning on the Saturday and if they wanted to getting to those consultative or training sessions that take place on Saturday ahead of the conference rally. Also depending on when our transport could be booked we either left before the leader's speech to head for trains north on the Wednesday or immediately afterwards.
If you are going to make a full day Saturday and a full day Tuesday people coming from further afield are going to have to come down a day early and stay overnight on the Friday and probably are still going to need somewhere to stay on the Tuesday night after a full day thus meaning an EXTRA nights accommodation at GREATER COST. This could actually result in having to take an EXTRA DAY OFF work for those wanting to get to conference from any distance.
Travel on a Friday is often dear than on a Saturday and harder to come by as weekly commuters also are looking for travel option at this time especially in the evening, which is the time that most from the North will probably be hitting London looking to get to those south coast resorts that hold the majority of our Autumn conferences. Of course Northern Liberal Democrats could break their journey here and like the London and southern based Liberal Democrats travel down on Saturday morning when fares are cheaper. But we'd have to find more expensive accommodation for one night in the capital.
Yes the proposals are clearly not to make conference cheaper for delegates outside the London commuter belt, in fact they are bound to make it more expensive for those in the North and Scotland to attend Federal conference and are merely a way to make it cheaper to host but will make it more Southern Centric and less democratic as an upshot.
I think I can just about make it home (to Manchester) on the Tuesday evening, but I definitely have to travel down on the Friday - even if I got the 5:25 first train, I wouldn't be in Brighton before 9:40 on the Saturday (and I'd have to go to the hotel to get rid of my luggage before I could do anything in the conference, which means not getting there until 10:30 or so), and it's at least five hours' drive, so I'd be up even earlier to drive.
ReplyDeleteAnd I'm travelling half the distance that people are from Scotland, and I can walk from home to a mainline railway station - if you're travelling from somewhere more suburban or rural you have to get to that mainline station, and your local trains are not going to be running at five o'clock on a Saturday morning!