A party conference is actually quite an impressive affair. Politics at its most professional and amateur in equal measure, writes Liam Booth-Smith.

The set piece speeches, the confluence of money and media, the sheer maddening concentration of everything. All blended with the activist base, free refreshment and candid conversation. It's a political miracle that so much policy can come out of something Labour spinner and writer Damian McBride accurately described as an ‘18-30's holiday in suits'.