Comment 22 for bug 372132

Might I suggest this:

Create a ~/Templates folder by default (by placing it in /etc/skel), and populate it with symbolic links to new template files located at /usr/share/default-templates (this is a new directory, and files in here do not show up as templates by default, unlike /usr/share/templates).

This can be done entirely with a separate package (default-templates) and shouldn't bother upstream. It will allow the user to remove a template (by deleting the symbolic link), and allow us to update a template (by updating the package).

The downside is that we can't add any new templates to an existing user's folder when they upgrade, but that's also the situation today. I don't see an easy way of allowing users to delete templates while also shipping a default set, not without upstream code changes.