With The High Wages And Other Perks

[DrFilth]

do they need the free travel passes ?


Champagne quaffing Tory members heading to the Conservative Party Conference in Manchester this week will receive free `System One' travel passes for bus, trains and trams, worth around £130,000, courtesy of local council tax payers of Salford and Greater Manchester.

The estimated 4,000 Tory Party members attending the five day event (out of 12,000 delegates) will receive a free System One travel pass, for which the nearest equivalent – a County Card – would normally cost £33.30.

Give or take a few blue rinses and pinstriped prats from the City, the full cost works out around £130,000. The Conservative Party Conference website states…

"System One are pleased to offer complimentary travel cards for all Party Member representatives attending the event. These will be valid on bus, tram and train travel in Greater Manchester and will be presented in a travel pack with map and further information on getting around Greater Manchester. This will be issued with your Conference security photographic pass and handbook…"

http://www.conservativepartyconference.org.uk/

[factor-fiction]

Will they be quaffing champagne on the bus?

[factor-fiction]

The councils are Labour run, so it would seem odd.
Maybe there is more to this story

[ummmm]

Hope not. We're not allowed to quaff champers on the bus....

[tonyav]

Probably and eating caviar .

[factor-fiction]

Tory voter= champagne quaffing City pratt in a pinstrip or lady with a blue rinse? I can't see them getting the bus through Ancoats

[DrFilth]

ancoats is getting smaller people now know it as new islington

[DrFilth]

Richard Soper, Chair of Greater Manchester Travelcards Ltd
"The travelcard we are offering to the delegates is one which has been specially produced for this purpose as a promotional venture, and is not available to buy" he added "The decision to support local events such as this is taken by the Board of the company, most of whose members are directors of the local bus companies "

[Gromit]

Visitors to any city should be encouraged to used public transport instead of bringing their cars which glog up local commerce. The venue is central and most amenities are in walking distance. The system One pass means they can hop on and off of the extensive tram network.

So it is not a perk, it is a carrot combat congestion in the City.

[woofgang]

So the taxpayers aren't paying it sounds like it's the normal sort of thing done commercially to promote a town as a conference venue, rather than a political statement.

[Eve]

Going by previous conferences here, I can't see them going anywhere fast on buses round there, especially around rush hour! Trams shouldn't be so bad save for the big metal detectors they tend to have up round St Peter's Square and the bits sealed off by armed police - I imagine GMEX will be similarly policed.

Sunday is going to be interesting with the start of the conference and TUC march, seen plenty of flyers round Oxford Road for other marches and protests too, NHS seemed to be a main one.

I'm so glad I don't go in in rush hour anymore! Remember previous chaos and having to get off the bus and walk a long way into work as traffic was just gridlocked.

http://www.manchestereveningnews.co.uk/news/greater-manchester-news/manchester-city-centre-protected-ring-6096536

Bits of Ancoats are still there, though I think they are trying to edge it out bit by bit by new apartment complexes. A lot more free ground than I thought there was, I hadn't noticed until they ran the trams through there out to Droylsden. Don't imagine it will stay that for long though!

I don't mind the bus though haven't walked round there since I got my drink spiked the one and only time I went to Sankeys, not a good memory!

Ummm...not much is challenged on buses round here! Think people are too scared to most of the time. Even the ticket inspectors go in twos now and have a police escort with them, always two inspectors and two police on Stagecoach buses. Tram wise, there tend to be more of them on at a time though I've seen police on with them too.

[mikey4444]

A Tory official...on a bus ?

If you see any, take some photos !

[anotheoldgit]

Obviously an anti Tory post.

Have you any idea if there were any Champagne quaffing Labour members, and how did they get to Brighton, on their bikes?

/// Give or take a few blue rinses and pinstriped prats from the City, ///

A typical lefty abusive description, of those who may happen to be a little better off, than some.

Total envy, nothing more.

[factor-fiction]

I saw it more as humour, AOG

[emmie]

though it occasionally happens, you can't take alcohol on public transport

[Peter Pedant]

FF do buses run down New Mill St.,

and if they do - do they come out of the other end ?

all ask.

Negotiated I would have thought - block of tickets bought at a discount
so there is a subsidy - but that is thro the conference fee itself.

[mikey4444]

Play nicely girls !

[emmie]

just another pop at the tories....

[Sqad]

A little story for you which does indeed fit into the topic of the thread.......I think.

On one of my many R&R visits to the UK, I met a woman in the hotel cocktail bar and engaged her in conversation. She was a well know Trades Union Representative and was on her way to the Trades Union Conference in Brighton.
As we were both alone, I invited her to dine with me to which she readily accepted.
Now,....the point of my post. I always thought that these political conferences were boring occasions, paint drying stuff during the day and pie and chips at night or oysters and champagne depending upon which political party to which you subscribed.

Not a bit of it........

Apparently each trade union put on an evening show, no expenses spared, extraordinary food, plenty of it, free booze and the latest and most popular cabaret act.......each Union trying to outdo the other Unions.....no talk of minimum wage, NHS, homeless and the fat Tory bastards.

Interesting eh?