More than 1,000 delegates will attend the Labour Party’s 2010 National Conference which will be held in the Baily Allen Hall, NUI, Galway, from Friday April 16 to Sunday 18.
Labour are performing strongly in the polls and are in a solid position to enter Government after the next election. Confidence in the party is high right now and Galway is an appropriate location for the party to hold its conference.
Labour leader Eamon Gilmore is originally from Co Galway, while party president Michael D Higgins is TD from the Galway West constituency. Also deputies Gilmore and Higgins, along with former party leader Pat Rabbitte, are graduates of NUIG (or UCG as it was then ). Dep Gilmore was also a former president of the Students’ Union at UCG.
The main event of the conference will be the address by party leader Eamon Gilmore at 8.30pm on Saturday April 17, which will be televised live by RTÉ. Party president Michael D Higgins will deliver his presidential address on Friday at 9.45pm.
Among the guest speakers at the conference will be the recently elected new leader of the SDLP, Margaret Ritchie MLA.
The conference will hear more than 150 motions on the event’s agenda, with the emphasis being on the economy, the banking crisis, and jobs. Education and justice also feature heavily.
There will be 15 workshops on such topics as the economy, youth unemployment, political reform, pension reform, public transport, and tourism. Delegates will also elect a new party executive and there will be a contest for the position of party chair.
The televised session on Saturday between 11am and 1pm is likely to be used to promote the party’s proposals for jobs and the economy.
However the party conference is expected to provide a boost to the local Galway economy, for when visitors, observers and members of the media are taken into account it is expected the conference will bring up to 1,500 people into the city over that weekend.
The official conference hotel is the Meyrick on Eyre Square and a range of social events have been arranged at that venue for visiting delegates, local Labour supporters, and the public.
