British shadow chancellor resigns

    LONDON, Jan. 20 (Xinhua) -- British Shadow Chancellor¹ of the Exchequer² Alan Johnson resigned on Thursday for "family and personal reasons.""I have decided³ to resign from（辞职） the shadow cabinet for personal reasons to do with my family. I have found it difficult to cope with these personal issues in my private life whilst carrying out an important frontbench role," he said in a statement.
    "I am grateful to Ed Miliband for giving me the opportunity to serve as shadow chancellor of the exchequer. He is proving to be a formidable leader of the Labor⁴ Party and has shown me nothing but support and kindness," he said. "My time in Parliament（议会，国会） will now be dedicated⁵ to serving my constituents⁶ and supporting the Labor Party. I will make no further comment about this matter."Shadow Home Secretary Ed Balls replaced Johnson and Yvette Cooper took over as shadow home secretary.
    Labor Party leader Ed Miliband said Johnson's resignation was for personal reasons and has "nothing to do with the job".
    Miliband said he had accepted the resignation "with great regret.""As shadow chancellor and a politician who held five cabinet positions, Alan showed real leadership on issues that mattered to families across our country, warning of the dangers posed by the government's gamble on growth and jobs, promoting educational opportunity and delivering neighborhood policing," he said.
    Miliband added the party's economic policy would be unchanged, noting that "Ed Balls is an outstanding economist⁷ and is hugely qualified⁸ to take our economic message to the country.""He's going to be continuing the direction of our economic policy which is about growth and jobs and cutting the deficit⁹ rather than this Conservative-led government that's going too far and too fast with deficit reduction," he said.(本文由在线英语听力室整理编辑)

1 chancellor   

n.(英)大臣；法官；(德、奥)总理；大学校长

参考例句：

• They submitted their reports to the Chancellor yesterday.他们昨天向财政大臣递交了报告。
• He was regarded as the most successful Chancellor of modern times.他被认为是现代最成功的财政大臣。

2 exchequer   

n.财政部；国库

参考例句：

• In Britain the Chancellor of the Exchequer deals with taxes and government spending.英国的财政大臣负责税务和政府的开支。
• This resulted in a considerable loss to the exchequer.这使国库遭受了重大损失。

3 decided   

adj.决定了的，坚决的；明显的，明确的

参考例句：

• This gave them a decided advantage over their opponents.这使他们比对手具有明显的优势。
• There is a decided difference between British and Chinese way of greeting.英国人和中国人打招呼的方式有很明显的区别。

4 labor   

n.劳动，努力，工作，劳工；分娩；vi.劳动，努力，苦干；vt.详细分析；麻烦

参考例句：

• We are never late in satisfying him for his labor.我们从不延误付给他劳动报酬。
• He was completely spent after two weeks of hard labor.艰苦劳动两周后，他已经疲惫不堪了。

5 dedicated   

adj.一心一意的；献身的；热诚的

参考例句：

• He dedicated his life to the cause of education.他献身于教育事业。
• His whole energies are dedicated to improve the design.他的全部精力都放在改进这项设计上了。

6 constituents   

n.选民( constituent的名词复数 )；成分；构成部分；要素

参考例句：

• She has the full support of her constituents. 她得到本区选民的全力支持。
• Hydrogen and oxygen are the constituents of water. 氢和氧是水的主要成分。 来自《简明英汉词典》

7 economist   

n.经济学家，经济专家，节俭的人

参考例句：

• He cast a professional economist's eyes on the problem.他以经济学行家的眼光审视这个问题。
• He's an economist who thinks he knows all the answers.他是个经济学家，自以为什么都懂。

8 qualified   

adj.合格的，有资格的，胜任的，有限制的

参考例句：

• He is qualified as a complete man of letters.他有资格当真正的文学家。
• We must note that we still lack qualified specialists.我们必须看到我们还缺乏有资质的专家。

9 deficit   

n.亏空，亏损；赤字，逆差

参考例句：

• The directors have reported a deficit of 2.5 million dollars.董事们报告赤字为250万美元。
• We have a great deficit this year.我们今年有很大亏损。