Commenting on the Cabinet reshuffle, Liberal Democrat leader Sir Menzies Campbell said:

"The Prime Minister is having to shuffle with an increasingly battered pack. No amount of cosmetic surgery can disguise the fact that this Government has suffered a permanent loss of credibility.

"He should not have waited until now to release the Home Secretary from his duties. He had said Charles Clarke should remain to sort out the mess at the Home Office. Mr Clarke has gone but the mess remains.

"The Prime Minister needs to spell out his own exit strategy. His Government now seems to lurch from one crisis to the next. Until he is clear about his own departure date, there is no reason to believe this pattern will end."