Breaking: Maria Miller resigns

Listen: Fraser Nelson, James Forysth and Isabel Hardman discuss Miller’s resignation

In the past few minutes, Maria Miller has resigned. The issue wasn’t going to go away, thanks in no small part to the way that the Culture Secretary and Number 10 had handled the story. A lack of contrition in the Chamber last Thursday coupled with the Prime Minister’s ‘warm support’ for his minister gave the impression that no-one at the centre of the government saw how this would play with voters. It is significant that those MPs who did break cover and criticise her all focused on the nature and quality of her apology in the Commons, not the detail of her expenses claims per se.

As Miller says in her letter, ‘the present situation has become a distraction from the vital work this Government is doing to turn our country around’: yesterday the IMF upgraded the UK’s growth forecast, but this further evidence that George Osborne had survived his own ‘364 economists‘ moment was largely ignored.