The British Prime Minister, Tony Blair, has carried out a radical reshuffle of his cabinet following big losses in the English local elections.
The principal casualty is the former Home Secretary, Charles Clarke, who returns to the backbenches following the political crisis caused by a failure to deport foreign prisoners.
He is replaced by former Defence Secretary John Reid.
However, Patricia Hewitt has retained her job as Health Secretary despite growing unease amongst health workers and voters over Mr Blair's much vaunted reforms of Britain's National Health Service.
The other cabinet minister to have attracted negative publicity was John Prescott, over his affair with his secretary.
He has retained his title of deputy prime minister but he will lose his government department and apparently much of his real job.
Jack Straw has been replaced as Foreign Secretary by former Environment Secretary Margaret Beckett.
The Northern Secretary Peter Hain is to stay in his job as the North's assembly prepares to reconvene later this month.
This morning's reshuffle was one of the swiftest since Mr Blair came to power nine years ago.
And while there are few new faces in the front ministerial rank it has been designed to give the impression of a reinvigorated government.
Reshuffle follows loss of 250 local seats
The reshuffle follows the Labour Party's poor showing in the English local elections; it lost more than 250 councillors, while the opposition Conservatives made gains.
The reshuffle could be Mr Blair's last as the election results are likely to increase pressure on him from inside the Labour party to stand down sooner rather than later in favour of Chancellor Gordon Brown.
Labour had been expecting a battering at the polls across England after several weeks of bad headlines.
Some 23 million people, or more than half the British electorate, were entitled to go to the polls in 176 local authorities.
The Conservatives gained more than 200 seats, but failed to make the expected breakthrough in the north of England.
In what was the party's first major electoral outing since David Cameron took over as leader, the Conservatives had their best showing since 1992 with a 40% share of the vote.
The Liberal Democrats, under their new leader, Menzies Campbell, made little headway, possibly because of the Conservatives’ good performance.
The far-right British National Party gained 13 council seats - most of them in its target area of Barking in east London where it has become the official opposition to Labour.
