Dear Prime Minister

I regret that I’ve been asked to resign from the Government following breaches of the ministerial code, for which I apologise... From the outset I have been clear that I did not download or view pornography on my parliamentary computers. I accept that I should have been clear in my press statements that police lawyers talked to my lawyers in 2008 about the pornography on the computers, and that the police raised it with me in a subsequent phone call in 2013. I apologise that my statements were misleading on this point. The unfounded and deeply hurtful allegations that were being levelled at me were distressing both to me and my family and it is right that these are being investigated by the Metropolitan Police’s professional standards department. I am grateful that the Cabinet Secretary has concluded that my conduct as a minister has generally been both professional and proper. I deeply regret the distress caused to Kate Maltby following her article about me and the reaction to it. I do not recognise the events she described in her article, but I clearly made her feel uncomfortable and for this I apologise. Yours, Damian