A diary from down under

Friday 5 May

Talk about straight into work - the 7 am flight from Sydney gets me to Melbourne in time for my first 9.15 UK Skills Bid Team briefing. Most of the Bid Team has arrived, everyone is bonding and the level of enthusiasm is high. Not much sign of our Gothenburg rivals but the Melbourne team seems to be all over the hotel like a rash.

The day is spent setting up our marketing suite and making contact with a few of the delegates who have arrived early. There are some 50 delegations coming - 12 of whom are not voting members.

Dinner is a team-building exercise, where UK Skills chair Chris Humphreys and Graeme Hall, the chief executive pump us up. We hear that there is a Government reshuffle back in London and that Ivan Lewis MP and champion of UK Skills has been moved and that he, as one of our secret weapons, is not going to arrive. Ah! Is it all going wrong?

Saturday 6 May

I go out and observe the Skills Australia Competition. This national competition is like our Skills City and features some 47 trades covering everything from web design to meat retailing and includes electrical control systems, electrical installation systems. With up to six competitors in each trade area it gives some idea of the scale of things to be organised at Excel if we win the bid - here there are some 210 competitors, in London it could be as many as 1000.

They are also running "Try a Trade", which gives the children the chance to experience what a trade really consists of. It is excellent and I resolve to report back on an idea we can adopt back home ie steal.

This evening's formal dinner is oversubscribed. No problem, Melbourne is the culinary centre of Australia and I'm off the leash. I end up in a bar and the only food I manage is crisps - but the beer is very good.

Sunday 7 May

Most delegates have now arrived and we need to start gently lobbying them about the benefits of holding the WorldSkills Competition in 2011 in London. I don't find this difficult - not because I'm an out and out Londoner, but because the information, factsheets, brochures and little red London Routemaster bus fridge magnets that we have to give out are enough to make a man who is proud of London cry!

My given job for the day is to attend the World Leadership Forum, also being held in Melbourne, where many delegates will be found. In the evening I'm given the task with Tara Kennedy, the UK Skills bid project manager, to entertain the Dutch and Norwegian delegations at a private dinner. All goes well, except I can't find the restaurant and when I do the Dutch delegate falls into the fish pond. Don't ask.

Monday 8 May

A day of lobbying in the marketing suite. We have set up large-screen TVs showing loops of film on London, Excel and our bid introduced by, among others, Jamie Olivier. In addition, Claridge's has sent its executive chef Martyn Nail and Adam Peirson (an ex-WorldSkills competitor) and they are preparing canapés - the delegates (and the staff) love these. Yesterday they did afternoon tea - the world seems to be melding into a continuum of briefing, eating, lobbying, briefing, lobbying, eating…

Tuesday 9 May

More lobbying, but it's starting to get tense. Today Claridges did a selection of risottos. I've noticed that those delegates who came to the afternoon tea and canapé demonstrations come to this one as well - strange that!

Tonight's the UK reception. All the bid teams are allowed a 1½ hour reception, ours involves a hair fashion show undertaken by two representatives of Toni & Guy. We also have a Beatles Tribute band that had the delegates dancing and screaming for more, and waiters dressed in ‘traditional' British costume -a policeman, beefeater and guardsman, as well as a kilt-wearing Scotsman. I'm upset that I wasn't asked to dress up - it must be my legs.

The evening is a great success and we think that we won the South Tyrol vote by taking a photo of the delegate undressing the Scottish waiter and putting on the oh-too-small kilt.

Wednesday 10 May

Today's the day! To celebrate we have our briefing at 7.30. Today's task is to not lose votes. The vote follows the three formal, 20-minute presentations to the General Assembly and the whole process starts at 2.30. The Australians pull off a coup by arriving with a Baby Kangaroo and a pair of Koalas. London is last up and has a mix of speakers and video clips including Tony Blair (who, interestingly, the Australians use to promote Melbourne).

The voting takes forever - there are 38 delegates and an overall majority (20 votes) is required to win. The count is interminable - they can't get the result onto the computer to put on the screen, the vice-chair of World Skills (it has to be the vice-chair because the chair is Australian) starts to speak. Finally, the screen comes to life…Melbourne 9 votes, Gothenburg 8 votes, London 21 votes. We've won, we've won on the first vote - I get to my feet and start screaming, and crying, and hugging, and cheering, and being smug, not having doubted for one moment that we would win.

Eventually all calms down and it's all over - bar the partying; oh the partying! Off come the suits, on go the Bula shirts, in come the band. Chris keeps telling us that now the hard work is just about to start. It's a late evening/early morning, who knows!

Thursday 11 May

No briefing but I still arrive at the marketing suite at 9.15 to find it already packed by Mike Kennedy, our Australian technical supremo. One of the things I have learnt is that an Australian from Sydney is your best possible mate if you are competing against Melbourne. Time to go home. Chris' words from the previous day come back to me. The hard work now begins.