Prescott 'has paid for his sins'

John Prescott has 'suffered enough' for his affair with his secretary and should not have to resign, one of his cabinet colleagues has insisted.

Defence secretary John Reid said the deputy prime minister had done something he "deeply regrets now", but said it was "largely a private matter" and he and his wife, Pauline, should be able to resolve their problems in private.

Many believe Mr Prescott, who is also deputy leader of the Labour party, is now too much a subject of ridicule to continue in his job, but Mr Reid told BBC News 24: "If he has sinned, he has certainly suffered in the past few days."

Mr Prescott is coming under increasing pressure about his relationship with Tracey Temple, particularly given the revelation that she was driven to and from their secret meetings in Mr Prescott's official government car.

Conservative MP Derek Conway has written to the cabinet secretary questioning whether Mr Prescott has broken the ministerial code, and reports suggest that both the Cabinet Office and the minister's own department are looking into the affair.

The deputy prime minister has rejected Ms Temple's claims – in particular her assertion that sexual encounters took place in his private office while civil servants worked outside – as an attempt to gain "maximum financial advantage" from her story.

But yesterday the Conservatives kept up the pressure, with constitutional affairs spokesman Oliver Heald questioning whether Mr Prescott's antics were likely to put women off joining the civil service.

"Does the minister agree that it would help the government's diversity agenda, and the recruitment of women in the civil service, if there was a civil service Act to protect them from being asked to do things that they do not consider appropriate?," he said.

"Does he think that female recruitment and progression will be helped or hindered by the recent revelations from the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister?"

Only the prime minister can authorise an investigation into the conduct of one of his ministers, despite the appointment of a new independent advisor to ministers on the code of conduct.