To say that the Conservative Party conference changed everything would be an overstatement, but everything seems to have changed since it was held. Following on from Bournemouth, the Blackpool event was completely dominated by the discussion of an imminent election - an election, in the end, which was not to be.

The ICAEW was hosting a fringe meeting on tax policy with the Reform think tank and we were fortunate that the discussion took place after George Osborne's speech, which made tax the hottest topic of the week.

We had about fifty attendees and
it was remarkable that around half of them wanted to ask questions, so much so that we ran out of time.

Francesca Lagerberg, formerly Chair of the Tax Faculty, together with Phillip Hammond who is the Shadow Chief Secretary to the Treasury were able to deal with the questions raised very satisfactorily.

Following the fringe meeting the Institute hosted a small private dinner attended by four shadow ministers which was very useful in respect of building links and discussing ideas in a confidential enviroment.

Attending the three main party conferences has required a significant amount of time and effort and, while the payback is not immediately apparent, I do see this as a valuable investment which helps us to build our profile and add value to public policy discussions. 

Building relations with policymakers is something that we need to continually work at to get the changes we need to improve the environment for UK business.

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