Here is a helpful web application for Labour ministers. Simply print out this post and cross out the choices as applicable. Then hand in at 10 Downing Street.
The Deputy Prime Minister/The Secretary of State
ODPM/DEFRA/The Home Office/Department of Health
27 April 2006
Dear Tony,
Over the last few days I have reflected on the recent situation. While I welcome your public support for me and have enjoyed my time at the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister/DEFRA/the Home Office/the Department of Health, I believe it is time I consider my position in the interests of the party.
I do, of course, take no blame for shagging my secretary/the hardship of farmers/the thousand foreign prisoners that should have been considered for deportation but weren’t/the current ruddy health of the NHS, but I realise that my continuing in post may have an adverse effect come the local elections on May 4. I hope that nothing here precludes me from returning to the Cabinet in June.
I trust that my departure will be seen by the press and the public as the end of the issue, even though my wife’s not happy/farmers still haven’t been paid/foreign ex-cons are still on the loose and planning to murder all the children/someone sacked all the nurses. I therefore regretfully tender my resignation as Deputy Prime Minister/Environment Secretary/Home Secretary/Health Secretary in order to spend more time with my wife/caravan/pies/superciliousness.
All best wishes,
John/Margaret/Charles/Pat
In Response:
Dear John/Margaret/Charles/Pat,
It is with regret that I graciously have to accept your resignation. You have been a sterling servant to my Government through all three term. Your efforts at the the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister/DEFRA/the Home Office/the Department of Health have brought great results especially in the last 12 months when it has been a great year in your department.
Yours Tony
PS (not for publication in the press)
Thank you for falling on your sword so honourably, my office (ha yes, mine all mine) will be in touch in a suitable number of months to suggests ways you can be of use to me again. Especially as I attepmt to keep Gordon at bay.
Oh God. See what’s happened now this has been allowed to drag on for a couple of days? The government have unleased Hazel Blears. Hazel sodidng Blears. She’s on Newsnight now.
We give in. Please, please, put Blears back in her box. We’ll stop asking questions.
Blears on Newsnight and Wallpaper Faulkner on QT what has NuLabour come to if these are tonights spokespeople.
Is it me, or was TB’s sidelining of Jack Straw something akin to Lord Archer publicly humiliating Ted Francis? Face it, Uncle Jack knows where the bodies are buried, Dunblane for example. And unlike Nobby Clarke, essentially Jack did nothing wrong, if you overlook that distressing incident at the Labour Party Conference. But the Devil’s in the detail: There’s Jack saying that an attack on Iran was absurd, when he should have been saying a nuclear attack was out of the question. I think Tony’s goose is well and truly cooked, but time will tell. The sooner he’s no longer Prime Minister the sooner he can be arrested for high treason. Don’t make any holiday plans, sunshine.
Dear Tony,
Over the last few days I have reflected on the recent situation. While I welcome your public support for me and have enjoyed my time at the Office of the Prime Minister, I believe it is time I consider my position in the interests of the party.
I do, of course, take no blame for invading Iraq/poor election results/endless speculation on my departure date/nine years of unfulfilled promise, but I realise that my continuing in the post may have an adverse effect come the General Election in May 2009. I hope that nothing here precludes me from returning to the Cabinet in June.
I trust that my departure will be seen by the press and the public as the end of the issue, even though I will malinger malevolently like my idol, Thatcher, over my successors. I therefore regretfully tender my resignation as Prime Minister in order to spend more time with my wife’s hairdresser.
All best wishes,
Tony
Duran Duran Duran will continue as a… no piece. They hope to release a new album in the new year.