Allen & Unwin UK to publish On This Day in Politics: Britain’s Political History in 365 days by Iain Dale

An informative, accessible and opinionated book on key moments in British political history on every day from 1 January to 31 December

Allen & Unwin UK have acquired UK and Commonwealth, excluding Canada, rights to On This Day in Politics by Iain Dale from Northbank’s non-fiction agent Martin Redfern, and will publish in hardback in October 2022.

From the first meeting of an elected English parliament on 20 January 1275 to the abolition of the Slave Trade on 25 March 1807; from the Peterloo massacre of 16 August 1819 to Britain voting to leave the EU on 23 June 2016, On This Day in Politics charts the main events of the last few hundred years, with one event per page, per day.

Ed Faulkner, Publisher at Allen & Unwin UK, says, ‘I am absolutely delighted to be working with Iain once again and bringing him to Allen & Unwin and Atlantic Books.  I hope he won’t mind me saying that nobody is more obsessed about the history of British politics than he is, so he is the perfect author for what will be a treasure trove of 800 years of British political history, featuring fascinating characters and events and a few surprises to boot.’

Iain Dale says, ‘I hope On This Day in Politics will add to people’s knowledge of some of the most well known, and many of the lesser known, events in British political history. It is nothing if not eclectic and unpredictable, with pages on events that you would expect to read about, like the outbreak of the Second World War, but also less familiar entries like the election of Britain’s first black MP in 1832, the first sitting MP to come out as gay, the birth of Sir Robin Day, the creation of Britain’s first National Park and the day a future prime minister fought a duel with the Foreign Secretary. The book comprises 366 pages, 366 events, 366 words per entry. I hope readers’ imaginations will be captured by the stories covered in the book and they will then want to undertake further reading. If that happens my mission will have been accomplished.’