The rhetorical question- how to craft a great speech?

The Paul Richards column

With summer a fading memory, what will be occupying the minds of ministers and their advisers in coming days is the big conference speech. A conference speech is the chance for ministers to make or break their reputations. Many will try, but few will succeed, to capture the imagination of the political world, to coin a lasting phrase, or even to make the political weather. Every minister has dreams of a Brighton conference hall filled with cheering delegates in the aftermath of a barnstorming speech. Most will hear a few seconds’ polite applause as they return to their seats following a speech instantly forgotten.

What makes a tub-thumper, and what makes a damp squib? Here are my eight tips for anyone writing a minister’s conference speech.

1.       You can’t write a speech for a stranger.  What often goes wrong is that the speech-writer can’t hear the voice of the speaker in their heads, doesn’t know their preferences for particular words or phrases, or worse, tries to get them to use language which sounds inauthentic and alien in their mouths. The script has to match the speaker like a hand in a glove.

2.       This is Labour Party conference, not a trade association dinner. That means that this is a political speech, which has to show vision and leadership, express Labour values, describe our policies with passion and commitment, and dissect our enemies’ platform with forensic skill. Special advisers should be fined for any allowing any language into ministers’ speeches which is culled from government policy documents or departmental websites.

3.       A speech is like a building: it needs good materials, a strong structure, and beautiful adornments to make it stand out from the rest. The content of the speech is the glass, concrete, steel and wood. The architect’s drawings are the structure of the speech. But what turns a speech from the mundane to the memorable is the adornments: the designs, decorations and eye-catching devices which can delight an audience.

4.       Be unafraid to use rhetorical devices. On paper rhetorical devices look clunky and obvious. From the platform, they can be effective. Try groups of three (‘education, education, education’), or call-and-response (‘Yes we can’), or rhetorical questions (‘Why am I the first Kinnock in a thousand generations...’), or images (‘he didn’t riot, he got on his bike and looked for work’) or repetition of a theme (‘I have a dream’). There’s a vast toolkit of rhetorical devices, with complicated Greek names, which have been tried and tested down the centuries, so use them.

5.       Ask: what do I want to achieve? If you write a speech asking ‘what do I want to say?’ you’ll simply fill the time with words. Start by identifying what you want the speech to achieve. Is it to build the reputation of the minister, or take on a difficult argument, or explain a new policy, or attack the Tories, or garner a headline in tomorrow’s Mirror? If you don’t know what you want your speech to do, it won’t do it.

6.       Work out your media line. One of the main purposes of the conference, especially this one, is to project the image of the party to the public. No-one is watching the live TV coverage. Even the hall in Brighton may be half-empty. So the speech must contain a message which can be picked up by the broadcasters, websites and tomorrow’s papers. That’s the only way Labour’s message stands a chance of being heard by the voters. So work out the news line from the speech, and work the media area to sell it.

7.       Stick to the time. Every year ministers are told to stick to their allocated time slots, and every year some of their egos get the better of them and they speak for double the time. It causes a headache for the conference managers, but it also annoys delegates. A short speech is better than a long one. Delegates should start slow-hand clapping any minister who goes over their time, which robs party delegates of the chance to speak in the debates.

8.       Entertain us! Delegates are expected to pack the hall for the big set-pieces, to clap like seals, to laugh at even the weakest of jokes, and to not fall asleep in front of the TV cameras. That’s a big ask. So the least the ministers can do is to be entertaining. Let’s have some compelling anecdotes, cracking jokes,  laughter and tears, and some old time religion to make us feel good about being Labour.