Geoff Rowe, who founded the Leicester Comedy Festival in 1994, has sent out the following comedic statement.

"As some of you will know we have recently announced that Leicester Comedy Festival is the Official Comedy Party. in this world of Brexit, Farage, Trump, Clinton, May, Johnson and Corbyn, we reckon the UK needs a different kind of party; so we have decided to form this new kind of party. Our annual conference will take place from 8-26 February 2017 in Leicester and we are looking forward to confirming details about that soon.

In the meantime it seems appropriate that we should announce the resignation of our founding leader Geoff Rowe. Geoff has led the development of the party since 1994 but in light of inequalities of tea making and biscuit buying in the office (the final straw being someone used Geoff’s Superman mug), he has today decided to resign his position. This follows the news today that both UKIP and the Alliance Party have to find new leaders after both their leaders have resigned.

Leicester Comedy Festival feels it is important to be taken seriously as a Party and therefore Geoff has resigned in order to retain the Party’s credibility.

On announcing the news, Geoff said "The team is working well and I think it's an appropriate time to hand over to a new leader who will lead the party forward in the next stage of its development and growth."

A further announcement will be made tomorrow, along with news of the Official Comedy Party’s calypso song and photo opportunities of comedians kissing babies."

Rowe started the festival as part of his arts management degree and was awarded the BEM for his services to comedy in 2013. The festival had recently been sponsored by TV channel Dave, but from next year its main sponsor will be the place where Rowe studied, De Montfort University.

Update 6/10/16: Rowe has been in touch again to say that this is a satirical joke - he has issued a further statement withdrawing his resignation.