Nadine Dorries on book delay: Downing Street’s pushing a line I’ve been silenced

The Plot: The Political Assassination Of Boris Johnson will now be released on November 9.

Nadine Dorries has finally acted on her pledge to resign (Stefan Rousseau/PA) (PA Wire)

Nadine Dorries has claimed Downing Street is “pushing a line” that her delayed book launch is because she has broken the ministerial code and has been silenced.

The former culture secretary, 66, promised the book, titled The Plot: The Political Assassination Of Boris Johnson, would be “worth the wait” and stated it is “not a memoir” as she hit back on X, formerly Twitter.

The book had been scheduled for release on September 28, prior to the start of the Conservative Party conference in early October, but publisher HarperCollins announced on Thursday that it would be delayed until November 9.

Ms Dorries tweeted on Friday: “@10DowningStreet are pushing a line that I have been silenced and my book has been delayed because I have broken the ministerial code.

“Here is what the code says: ‘Former Ministers intending to publish their memoirs are required to submit the draft manuscript in good time before publication to the Cabinet Secretary and to conform to the principles set out in the Radcliffe report’.

“#The Plot is not a memoir.

“What they don’t seem to get is that it’s not about me or my time in office, it’s all about them.

“It’ll be worth the wait.”

Announcing the publishing delay, HarperCollins said that a “small delay” had been necessary to “allow for the huge volume of material the author has consulted, the number of high-level sources spoken to, and the required legal process needed to share her story”.

The publisher has previously described the book as a “seismic, fly-on-the-wall account of how the saviour of the Conservative Party became a pariah” and will feature “unparalleled access, from multiple inside sources talking with astonishing candour”.

Ms Dorries, the former culture secretary and a staunch ally of Mr Johnson, finally handed in her resignation over the weekend, with a by-election now set to be scheduled for Mid Bedfordshire.

Her departure came after weeks of pressure to act on her June 9 pledge to step down with “immediate effect”, in protest at not getting a peerage in Mr Johnson’s resignation honours list.

Her resignation came with a scathing attack on Prime Minister Rishi Sunak, claiming he presided over a “zombie Parliament”.

Ms Dorries, who was born in 1957 in Liverpool and grew up on a council estate, has written more than a dozen books during her career, including The Four Streets fiction series and The Lovely Lane collection – both of which are set in post-war Liverpool.

Downing Street and the Conservative Party have been contacted for comment.