UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson's government made an embarrassing U-turn on Thursday on plans to overhaul the system for combating parliamentary corruption, with the lawmaker whose case had provoked the row quitting his job.

Faced with unhappiness in his party and headlines accusing the prime minister and his Conservative administration of "sleaze," the government said it would think again about proposals it had pushed through parliament only the day before.

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Backed by Johnson, Conservative lawmakers narrowly voted to halt the recommended 30-day suspension from parliament of Owen Paterson, a former minister, who had been found guilty by parliament's standards watchdog of repeatedly lobbying for two firms, which paid him nearly three times his annual salary.

Instead, they pushed through a proposal to delay the suspension and set up a new committee to review his case and the wider system of investigating lawmakers.

But with growing outrage from opposition politicians and some within his own party, the government backtracked and said there would be another vote on the proposed suspension. Paterson then announced he was quitting "the cruel world of politics."

"The last two years have been an indescribable nightmare for my family and me," Paterson, whose wife took her own life last year, said in a statement. "I maintain that I am totally innocent of what I have been accused of."

Before the government's volte-face, several Conservative politicians had criticized their party's handling of the row, which commentators said reflected badly on the prime minister.

"This is one of the most unedifying episodes I have seen in my 16 years as a member of parliament," said Mark Harper, a Conservative lawmaker who rebelled against his party to oppose the plans.