Biteback reprints Damian McBride book

Biteback Publishing has begun a 10,000-copy second print run on Damian McBride's Power Trip: A Decade of Policy, Plots and Spin. The title is released on Wednesday (25th September).

The publisher said it had experienced "unprecedented pre-release demand over the weekend" for the hardback memoir, an account of McBride's controversial time as spin doctor to then-prime minister Gordon Brown, with the entire 5,000 first print run leaving the warehouse.

McBride's Power Trip has been serialised in the Daily Mail, creating headlines. However the timing of the release—while the Labour party conference takes place in Brighton—has attracted criticism from some.

Biteback publisher Iain Dale said: "Sometimes an empty warehouse is a lovely problem to wake up to on a Monday morning. It is a testament to the interest this extraordinary book is generating."

On "Newsnight" last night (23rd September), McBride defended the release of the book, saying: "There's no good time to publish a book like this", adding that it would have caused more damage had it been released closer to an election. However, he apologised for some of his actions during his time in the role, and said: "I do feel ashamed, I do feel sorry to those individuals whose careers I affected and even more so to the sort of innocent bystanders who were caught in the way."

In the book, McBride admits to leaking negative stories to the media about Brown's political rivals. Conservative MP Alun Cairns has called for police to investigate McBride on the grounds that he may have broken the Official Secrets Act and Computer Misuse Act, following admissions that he accessed Brown's emails without permission.

Dale has also been filmed in what the BBC describes as a "seafront scuffle" in Brighton, while attempting to prevent an anti-nuclear protestor from hijacking a publicity interview with McBride.