DOWNING Street was left embarrassed today after accidentally branding one of its former staff members "a prat".
The less-than-flattering description of Tony Blair's ex-aide Benjamin Wegg-Prosser surfaced on Number 10's new website due to a technical glitch.
A series of test pages from last year appeared at the bottom of a list of current Cabinet members.
One, dated May 4 last year, was headlined "PM backs Benjy in 'prat' row", and added: "The Prime Minister has backed his special adviser, saying he's 'a prat, but not the prat"'.
The comment is believed to refer to an incident when an unnamed minister labelled Mr Wegg-Prosser "a prat" for coming up with the idea of allowing e-petitions on the Downing Street website.
Nearly two million people signed up to a call to abandon road pricing plans, causing considerable discomfort for the Government and then-Transport Secretary Douglas Alexander.
Mr Wegg-Prosser later defended the e-petition system, although his friends insisted he was not solely responsible for its adoption.
The link to "BWP Home" from the test page brought up an image of actor Daniel Radcliffe playing Harry Potter – widely held to resemble Mr Wegg-Prosser.
A Number 10 spokesman said the pages had been removed as soon as the mistake was spotted.
"These are test pages that were created several years ago and were carried over to the new Downing Street website in error and have now been removed," he added.
The malfunction is the latest to hit Number 10's new website, which has been widely criticised for launching without adequate tests.
A joke video clip mocking a petition calling for Top Gear presenter Jeremy Clarkson as Prime Minister has also been condemned as a waste of money by the Tories.
The full article contains 305 words and appears in The Scotsman newspaper.
