This year’s local party conference season will run in the shadow of the Haass talks. The content of speeches as well as the mood of delegates will be combed over to assess party aspirations and assessments of progress.
The parties will also be turning their messaging towards the European Election on 22 May 2014. The Green Party feted their Euro candidate – Ross Brown – way back at their 2012 conference. Earlier this year Sinn Féin re-selected Martina Anderson. The other parties have thus far not finalised or publicised their selections.
Party conferences will also be a vehicle to round up and sheep dip candidates for the upcoming shadow council elections (that may or may not be held on 22 May depending on the progress of the Local Government Bill).
2013
- [it’s not a party, but for completeness …] Saturday 5 October (10am-12.30pm) – Platform for Change AGM – Chinese Resource Centre, 1 Stranmillis Embankment, Belfast
- Saturday 12 October – PUP – Brownlow House, Lurgan [report on the conference and audio]
- Friday 18/Saturday 19 October – UUP – Ramada Hotel, Shaws Bridge [couple of blog posts and a review of conference with audio]
- Saturday 2 November – Green Party EGM – tba
- Friday 8-Sunday 10 November – SDLP – Armagh City Hotel [review of the conference with audio and an unexpectedly poetic contribution]
- Saturday 16 November – NI21 – Europa Hotel
- Saturday 16 November – éirígí – Wynn’s Hotel, Dublin
- Friday 22/Saturday 23 November – DUP – La Mon Hotel, Castlereagh [report]
- Saturday 23 November – Workers Party – Crescent Arts Centre, Belfast *change of date*
- Saturday 30 November – TUV – The Royal Hotel, Cookstown
2014
- Friday 7/Saturday 8 February – Sinn Féin – Wexford Opera House
- Saturday 22 March – Alliance – La Mon Hotel, Castlereagh
[preview and conference report] - Saturday 22 March – Labour Party NI Women’s Policy Conference: What Women Want – The Pavilion, Stormont, BT4 3TA (free to anyone who registers)
- Saturday 29 March (11.15am – 4pm) – Green Party AGM – Skainos centre, Newtownards Road, Belfast
(UKIP held their regional conference in Belfast’s Radisson Blu hotel on 6 June 2013.)
I’ll update this post with dates and venues from other parties – eg, Labour – who get in touch with information. Check out Slugger’s archive of commentary and reflection on previous party conferences.
Alan Meban. Tweets as @alaninbelfast. Blogs about cinema and theatre over at Alan in Belfast. A freelancer who writes about, reports from, live-tweets and live-streams civic, academic and political events and conferences. He delivers social media training/coaching; produces podcasts and radio programmes; is a FactCheckNI director; a member of Ofcom’s Advisory Committee for Northern Ireland; and a member of the Corrymeela Community.
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