British Justice Secretary and deputy prime minister Dominic Raab has resigned ahead of the publication of a report into claims of bullying.
Prime Minister Rishi Sunak received the report by barrister Adam Tolley KC into the allegations made by civil servants at the Department for Justice against the cabinet minister on Thursday.
Raab posted his two-page resignation letter on Twitter on Friday morning, ahead of the report's publication.
"Whilst I feel duty-bound to accept the outcome of the inquiry, it dismissed all but two of the claims levelled against me," Raab wrote, noting that he had asked for the probe after the allegations surfaced.
He insisted those two "adverse findings" were "flawed" and "set a dangerous precedent for the conduct of good government."
The justice secretary stressed that Tolley had found no evidence that he had sworn or shouted at civil servants in his department, thrown things or physically intimidated them or "sought to belittle anyone."
"In setting the threshold for bullying so low, this inquiry has set a dangerous precedent," Raab wrote. "It will encourage spurious complaints against ministers, and have a chilling effect on those driving change on behalf of your government — and ultimately the British people."
Raab also complained of the "systematic leaking of skewed and fabricated claims to the media" in violation of the inquiry's rules and the Civil Service Code of Conduct.
Some of the bullying claims — including that Raab picked tomatoes out of his salad at a working lunch and threw them noisily into a plastic bag — had been ridiculed in the British media.
Others include that he reject written reports that were not up to his standards an tell staff to re-write them.
Former Home Secretary Priti Patel was also accused of bullying by civil servants who she accused of obstructing the Conservative government's policies. Then-PM Boris Johnson refused to sack her following a report into the affair.