I feel speeches go on wayyyyy too long and for something that takes the whole colony it is usually not worth the time and to have all my people walk to the throne room, wait the hours long speech and have all of their meters run super low. After the speech my people usually all pull out emergency food and start gorging themselves.
Why hasn't this been fixed yet?
It's a bit long, but with a high-social noble is't basically a guaranteed +4 mood for 8 days. It even stacks, so my 2-noble colony with sky-high expectations gets by almost without breaks with only a bit of beer and tea. I'd say it's worth it.
As for bars being drained, just do it in the morning when everyone is rested and have already eaten?
So with 8 royals' you will have a speech each day which would lead to a very high mood for all, but cut down the work.
We are all happy but the corn rot on the field !