Sam Wheeler's conference diary

With political parties on a drive to attract younger voters, BBC News is sending three young people to the Liberal Democrat, Labour and Conservative party gatherings.

Here, Sam Wheeler, who attended the Lib Dem conference in Brighton, describes a day at the seaside.

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It's glorious sunshine on the penultimate day of the Lib Dem party conference. As a Mancunian I was therefore completely at a loss.

Chris Huhne seems amused by the T-shirt, not the questions

I'm at lunch which seems to co-incide with the time that everyone else is having lunch.

As I settle down I wonder, as I do repeatedly, just how much I can get away with on the BBC expense account. My idea of champagne and lobster is vetoed. Again.

I notice both Chris Huhne and Simon Hughes at separate tables. It seems I'm dining with The Men Who Would Be King.

I want to speak to Chris Huhne but at that moment in walks a former ruler, Lord Ashdown. I grab hold of him first.

He insists I call him Paddy. Paddy's a friendly and affable man, even when I forget exactly which Balkan micro-state he'd been in charge of.

These things come and go so fast after all.

I again target Chris Huhne though he looks at me a tad suspiciously.

I suppose I'm the first supposed hack he's seen in a Mickey Mouse t-shirt. Note to self: Do not bring Mickey Mouse T-shirt to a party conference again.

I see Chris Huhne and Simon Hughes at separate tables. I'm dining with The Men Who Would Be King

I ask him if he'd ever stand again for the leadership of the party. Funnily enough he gives the Standard Answer.

"We'll cross that bridge when we get to it." I point out that we're at the seaside and there are no bridges, rather piers.

So again I ask if he could tell me if he'd run for the party leadership?

"As I said, we have brilliant leader in Sir Menzies and that's all that matters." Fair enough.

We solicited a photo before he has to rush off.