Bill Harvey: It’s fun to stay

I agree with incoming BCLA President Keith Tempany – this year’s was a ‘great conference’.

It is getting on for 20 years since I first attended the BCLA, that year held in Brighton. This was the event which became famous for the high quality black rucksack which delegates were given and which many still use to this day. I remember sitting in the main auditorium and wondering who the flamboyant guy, surrounded by beautiful people as he swept into the room was – it turned out to be Brian Tompkins, future BCLA president and TV Masterchef contestant.

My other abiding memory of the conference was a realisation that, for too many years, I had not attended in the misguided belief that the event was aimed at those whose main area of work was contact lens practice. Instead I found a healthy mix of research and clinical practice, contact lenses and general optometry, professional matters and business.