Our work is carried out by a small team including freelance researchers and public affairs consultants who work on specific projects and campaigns. Here’s how YOU can help:
Attend our events
Forest has a well-deserved reputation for organising some of the best events at party conferences and elsewhere. Past highlights include our ‘Politics and Prohibition’ party at the 2006 Conservative conference in Bournemouth when we dressed a hotel ballroom to look like a Chicago speakeasy, complete with actors dressed as poker players. Later in the evening our thespians changed into police uniforms and staged a mock raid that culminated in the ‘arrest’ of one of our guest speakers. The charge? “Inciting people to enjoy themselves.”
Other Forest events on the Conservative fringe have included three comedy evenings (two at The Comedy Store in Manchester, one at the Hyatt Hotel in Birmingham) plus, in 2016, a party for 500 in Birmingham that was nominated for a ‘Best conference event’ award. More recently we have hosted a number of fringe events in the Think Tent at the Conservative Party conference, including a panel discussion at the 2022 Conservative conference entitled Politics & Prohibition: Should smoking be banned for good? (video).
We have also organised events at Labour and Liberal Democrat conferences including, in 2011, a party for 200 Labour party members at the famous Cavern Club in Liverpool. Naturally, it featured a Beatles’ tribute band.
Pre-Covid we hosted regular events in London including an annual boat party (‘Smoke on the Water’) attended by 200+ guests, and an annual Freedom Dinner for 150+ guests at Boisdale of Canary Wharf. Speakers included General Sir Mike Jackson, former head of the British army; journalists Rod Liddle, James Delingpole and Brendan O’Neil; and the late Lord Bell, former advisor to Margaret Thatcher and Ronald Reagan.
In June 2019 Boisdale of Canary Wharf was also the venue for our 40th anniversary gala dinner. Speakers were Claire Fox (now Baroness Fox of Buckley), and Mark Littlewood, director-general of the Institute of Economic Affairs. Professor Madsen Pirie, president and co-founder of the Adam Smith Institute, gave the toast, and presentations were made to celebrity restaurateur Antony Worrall Thompson, and former MSP and MEP Brian Monteith (a former spokesman for Forest in Scotland).
We have also organised numerous events at Boisdale of Belgravia, our favourite smoker-friendly bar restaurant in London, the famous Groucho Club in Soho, and the Houses of Parliament where, in 2011, we organised a reception for 200 people on the terrace at the House of Commons. Special guest and speaker that day was artist David Hockney.
Arguably our most successful event (it attracted camera crews from 12 countries) was our ‘Revolt In Style’ dinner for 400 people at the Savoy Hotel in London shortly before the introduction of the smoking ban in England in July 2007. Speakers included journalist and broadcaster Andrew Neil, TV chef Antony Worrall Thompson, and Claire Fox, director of the Academy of Ideas.
Recent events include Smoking Gun: Prohibition and the Infantilisation of Britain (March 2023), a reception at the House of Commons (February 2024), and our Beat The Ban lunch at Boisdale of Belgravia (May 2024) that were all part of our campaign against the generational smoking ban.
Donate
We welcome donations to support our work. Donations from individual supporters have ranged from £10 to £2000. Whatever you can afford to contribute, we would be grateful to accept. To make a donation please email contact@forestonline.org for further details.
Note: Forest reserves the right to decline donations should we choose to do so.
