Saturday starts at 8am for a breakfast session with other candidates and Alan Milburn. It's good to hear our campaign strategy from the man running it.
The highlight of the day is Gordon Brown's speech. He speaks passionately about his time in Africa "thoughts are with the millions we haven't helped" and about his hopes for improving the life chances of all: "cradle to nursery" is the crucial time. He finds time to bash the Tories a bit too: "We must expose the jobs lost if we come out of Europe" and he rubbishes Oliver Letwin who gives a new meaning to the term Shadow Chancellor.
Gordon is given a standing ovation and the crowd do not stop till he has gone backstage.
It's a bit of an anti-climax to go to the next session on the economy with Jane Griffiths (Minister for Work) and Paul Boateng (Treasury Minister). Unemployment now lowest since the Bay City Rollers were number one!!
I have lunch at a fringe meeting with John Curtice who is a sephologist - a statistician who specialises in elections. Very interesting for political anoraks. 6% of voters will vote tactically he said.
Tony Blair does a showpiece Q&A session in the afternoon, where he answers questions posed by members of the public via video, text and email. He comes up with some good answers, which I need to remember! "Vocational education must be as strong as academic education" he says.
last session of the day is a fringe meeting of the LGA, chaired by Tony Lewis from Suffolk. The speaker is education minister Ivor Lewis - I didn't ask if they were related! Ivor speaks very well. The thrust of is message is about "employability for life" and my interpretation of this, bearing in mind what Tony Blair has just said, is that there will be a strong focus on providing skills suitable for the workplace.
The evening is rounded off with a pizza where one of my dinner companions complains that there are more suits at conference this year!
