Shadow minister quits in adoption reform row

The shadow cabinet minister John Bercow has resigned in protest at Tory leader Iain Duncan Smith's tough line on adoption by unmarried couples, it emerged today.

Mr Bercow's resignation as shadow work and pensions minister comes just hours before MPs are due to vote in the House of Commons on Government proposals to change the law to allow gay and unmarried couples to adopt children.

Other members of Mr Duncan's team are also apparently threatening to boycott the vote.

Tory modernisers see it as a key issue which the party should use to highlight the way in which it has become more inclusive.

But Mr Duncan Smith insists that such a reform would be against children's interests because unmarried couples are more likely to split up.

Mr Bercow quit the shadow cabinet after Mr Duncan Smith imposed a three-line whip against Tory MPs opposing the move. Labour MPs have been given a free vote.

Conservative Party chairman Theresa May said: "I'm sorry that John feels it necessary to step down from the shadow cabinet on this issue but clearly its an issue on which he feels very strongly.

"Therefore he feels he is not able to go forward continuing to be a member of the shadow cabinet."

Mrs May defended the three-line whip, insisting it was in the interests of children.

"We have looked first and foremost at what is best for children," she said.

The key issue was that the children who would be affected were some of the most damaged and vulnerable children in society, she told the BBC Radio 4 Today programme.

"Many of them will have been in care, perhaps in and out of foster care, emotionally damaged," she said.

"Looking at that issue we believe the most important thing to do is to do our best to ensure that those children can be provided with the most stable background possible when they are adopted.

"There is no debate in this about whether unmarried couples can provide a loving home and a loving relationship and background for children - of course they can.

"The question is for these particularly damaged children, these very damaged children, what is the best way to provide the most stable background that we can?

"The evidence is that marriage is still providing the most stable background because married partners stay together longer."