Campbell diaries off Brown's reading list

Last Modified: 08 Jul 2007
Source: ITN

Prime Minister Gordon Brown said that he has no plans to read the long-awaited diaries of former Number 10 spin doctor Alastair Campbell.

Mr Brown said he wanted to get on with the job of running the country - insisting "the past is the past" and dismissing the importance of gossip and rumour.

Potential insights into Mr Brown's uneasy relationship with Mr Blair are among the revelations Westminster observers hope to find in Mr Campbell's book.

Mr Campbell is thought by many to be behind a jibe that the former Chancellor was "psychologically flawed", but asked what he would do if he was shown in a bad light, Mr Brown said: "I will not be reading it so I'll not know.

"If I'm told then that's it. But I am not going to get too excited about diaries. I really don't think that's the issue. The job is more important than the rumour, or the gossip, or the commentary about the past."

Asked if he thought it was right for someone in Mr Campbell's position to publish such an account, he said he did not "really don't know why it's been done" and stressed that he would be too busy to keep a diary himself.

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