The glossy newsletters, showing the Deputy Prime Minister's wife placing a supportive hand on her husband's shoulder, arrived just as revelations about his two-year affair with Civil Service secretary Tracey Temple were breaking.
The image of relaxed togetherness portrayed on the leaflet, which went out to 5,000 homes in the east of Hull, including Sutton, where he lives, was light years away from revelations of infidelity, which left Mrs Prescott "devastated".
And it comes as a blow to Labour locally. The party faces a knife-edge battle in next Thursday's local elections in the city.
Labour councillor Phil Webster said a copy dropped through his letterbox, alongside the election leaflet of his colleague Peter Clark, who is standing for election in the Ings ward next week.
He said: "My exact words were unprintable – I think it's an ill-timed leaflet and I think a lot of people will say 'hypocritical' and bin it."
But Coun Webster said Home Secretary Charles Clarke and the row over foreign prisoners mistakenly released by the Home Office was having more impact on voters, with only two he had spoken to mentioning the John Prescott saga.
And he expected Labour to win in Hull, albeit with reduced majorities.
Council deputy leader Daren Hale said: "It is John's annual report that happens to be going out in the election period and obviously given recent events the front page could appear unfortunate.
"But they shouldn't detract from the very big contribution John is making to improvements in east Hull."
Liberal Democrat group leader Carl Minns said the leaflet showed how desperate Labour was, adding: "It does scream hypocrite from the front page – I think Phil Webster is quite right. But what I am finding is concerning people on the doorstep is that 20 out of the 80 most dangerous foreign prisoners can't be found on the police national computer and they include a murderer and a rapist."
The four-page leaflet does not mention Mrs Prescott, apart from using her in the photograph, taken by a white rose in the garden of so-called "Prescott Towers" in Sutton. However, it makes heavy use of her husband, with five pictures, including one of him apparently being cuddled by a panda on a trip to China.
Mr Prescott faces continued questions from Tories over whether he breached the ministerial code in his affair with Ms Temple.
Yesterday, however, Prime Minister Tony Blair gave the beleagured Hull East MP his backing. Gordon Brown also showed his support, saying Mr Prescott was "a great colleague, the person who does so much to bring the Labour movement together".
A poll due to be broadcast on BBC2's Newsnight prog-ramme last night showed popular support for the Deputy PM; 57 per cent of those interviewed saying he should not quit. Only 37 per cent said he should go.