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Labour Conference 2

£4 MILLION DIVIDEND FROM LABOUR CONFERENCE

29-02-2008

Labour’s Spring Conference at the ICC this weekend will generate £4 million for Birmingham – but the city’s marketing boss says it’s just a “sprat to catch a mackerel”.

Some 4,000 delegates and 300 journalists will be descending on Brum over the next few days and they’ll be followed later this year by Conservative members attending their conference.

Marketing Birmingham’s Commercial Director Ian Taylor describes it as, “a great opportunity. We need to become a city that’s known for hosting big events and this will help that.

“We’ll be getting Birmingham on television because News 24 will be here, and if we can establish a reputation as the place where people come to meet for major discussions, that’s a good piece of positioning.”

It helps Taylor’s cause that the conference coincides with the Birmingham Post’s 150th birthday dinner tonight which is being attended by the David Cameron.

There can’t be many occasions in history when the city has hosted both the Prime Minister and the leader of the opposition.

There is, of course, a cost attached to hosting the conference – mostly subsidy to reduce the price of hiring the venue, but Taylor insists it’s “ a small percentage” of the extra £2 million given to Marketing Birmingham last year to attract landmark events.

He won’t reveal the precise figure because it’s commercially sensitive, but says, “for every £1 we spend we aim to make £12 back though the the restaurants, the hotels, the bars and so on.

“It’s a sprat to catch a mackerel – what we really want is a Labour party autumn conference, so this is a test to show what we can handle that.”