Publisher at war with nuke protester
Tuesday, September 24, 2013 at 11:43 
This is quite the funniest thing I have seen for a while.
Watching it made me wish I was in Brighton today, not for the Labour conference but to walk along the promenade, have a late breakfast at the Regency Restaurant overlooking the sea, and generally potter around my second favourite seaside resort.
But first I should declare an interest.
I have known Iain Dale for more than a decade. Together we produced a short-lived magazine called The Politico that was distributed to politicians, journalists and customers of Politicos bookshop that Iain founded and ran for several years.
Since then he's become a mini media mogul - an internet broadcaster, an influential political blogger and commentator, an award-winning presenter on LBC and, now, publisher of the hottest book of the year - Damien McBride's jaw-dropping Power Trip.
Iain is also a former Tory candidate so it's rather amusing to see him play the role of minder to a former Labour spin doctor, especially one as crazed as McBride, but a publisher has to protect his author, hence the incident that took place on the promenade at Brighton this morning.
In brief, McBride was being interviewed on ITV's Daybreak and behind him - taking advantage of the live broadcast - was an anti-nuclear protester with a placard and a dog.
Perhaps it was the bracing sea air, but what happened next can only be described as an undignified wrestling match between publisher and protester, with the latter coming off worse by virtue of the fact that his own dog was biting him on the bum!
Now, apart from my friendship with Iain, there's another link here because I'm pretty sure that the protester is the same man who turns up at all the main party conferences and his other hobby horse is tobacco.
If I'm right it's the man who in 2005 tried to hijack a photo op that Forest had organised with David Hockney - in Brighton!
I've written about it before but if I remember there were 20 or more photographers trying to take pictures of Hockney - who we had invited to speak at a Forest event - when our uninvited anti-tobacco protester decided to get in on the act by standing next to Hockney in full view of the cameras.
David, as you might imagine, thought it was quite funny and stood there with an amused look on his face.
The manager of the hotel where the pictures were being taken saw it a little differently and instructed a couple of burly bouncers to see the protester off the premises - cue a very similar wrestling match before the guy was bustled out through the fire exit.
The only difference was - he didn't have a dog with him!
At the time I was concerned that the pictures in the next day's papers would focus on the removal of the protester rather than Hockney's charming little cameo.
Thankfully that didn't happen but in hindsight it probably helped that the artist's response was so benign.
We'll find out in the next 24 hours whether Iain's decision to take the law into his own hands was the correct one.
In the meantime click here to enjoy the moment.
See also: Iain Dale scraps with protester at conference (Sky News)
Update: I can confirm that the protester is the same man who stood alongside Hockney in 2005.
Stuart Holmes is a well-known face at party conference. A hugely irritating one too. In fact I had my own run-in with him at the LibDem conference in Bournemouth in 2009. Click here.
Iain is currently getting some flack on his blog and elsewhere but, believe me, Holmes is a prat.
He's fully entitled to protest but he's completely intolerant of other people's views.
I've no time for him.
See: Anti-smoking protester hijacks plinth
Update: If you read nothing else today read Toby Young's take on this story - Damian McBride's publisher metes out punishment beating to protester on live TV (Telegraph blogs).
Note: Toby has the same problem with the spelling of 'protester' that I do. I had to return to this post this afternoon to change the spelling from 'protestor' to 'protester'!
Reader Comments (4)
Seriously funny on so many levels as Toby Young points out :>
(and the publicity won't hurt Iain either)
Just for the record (because it’s unfair to the dog otherwise), the dog wasn’t actually biting him on the backside – it seems to be hanging on to, first, its lead and, then, the bottom of his bag. Which, under the circumstances with all the scuffling and writhing around which was going on, was probably about the only thing it could do! In fact, I think that of the three of them, the dog is about the only one showing any restraint and probably the only one who emerged from the whole episode with a shred of dignity!
Protestor or Protester - both are acceptable. (such as focused or focussed) However, good practice is to choose one and then stick to it!
On the subject at hand - it is annoying that this guy will be pleased at the publicity!
Am I the only person who has noticed Dale's instant willingness to forgive McBride for what he did and snuggle up to this discredited New Labour bully-boy as soon as he has a chance to make a buck out of it for himself?
Given the nature of many of Dale's pompous lectures on MP's standards over the years I think I am entitled to comment on that.