Take their New Year conference - out of 29 speakers named on their promo leaflet, 27 are based in London. Only 2 of their invited speakers can talk from the experience of today about politics outside the capital city. (Though they both work in universities! But that's a different argument). Now it's true that some of the 27 are MPs, but only a couple can really claim to live in or about the constituency they represent - the majority are Londoners travelling out a couple of times a month to meet the natives.

There was a time when the Fabians would try to bring speakers from around the country to their big events, to try and develop a national perspective on the problems of the day. This was probably best illustrated when `local socialism' was being developed, with its emphasis on local councils and communities.

Is the concentration on London speakers just laziness? Or the lack of contact with the world outside London?  I don't know. But it doesn't have to be that way - the IPPR manage to have an office outside of London, perhaps it's an example the Fabians and others should take up.