Brown & Blair: portrait of a marriage

The relationship between Chancellor and Prime Minister is supposedly a tale of mutual paranoia, thwarted ambition, back-stabbing aides, spin and counter-spin. But there's more to it than that.

Gordon Brown does not normally indulge in moments of self-satisfaction. Last weekend, however, he was on something of a political high. The Chancellor was in Ottawa, attempting to persuade the World Bank in a long speech that "this generation has it in our power – if it so chooses – to abolish all forms of human poverty". His soaring words outlined in detail how the richer countries could act more cohesively to assist the world's poor. This agenda rouses Mr Brown's passions almost more than any other. Shortly after making the speech he flew back to London to discover that he was front-page news. Only the words raging around him had nothing to do with his crusading speech.

The "Blair/Brown" volcano had erupted again. At around the time Mr Brown was putting the case for reducing Third World debt, the former cabinet minister Mo Mowlam was speaking on television in Britain suggesting that the relationship between Mr Blair and Mr Brown was "crippling" the Government. The following day another former minister, Frank Field, suggested that Mr Blair would sack Mr Brown before very long. Whirling around these public comments were vitriolic quotes from "friends". This is a row that can erupt even when the two people at its heart are distracted by cataclysmic events across the globe.

As usual it was a sequence of coincidental events that caused the crisis . Mo Mowlam's comments were recorded last July. By chance they were broadcast last weekend as venomous ministers vented their fury over developments in the latest public spending round. In addition Mr Blair was preparing to make another upbeat speech on the euro. These speeches tend to induce bouts of neurotic exchanges between Downing Street and the Treasury. Some of the neurosis is purged by cathartic chats with journalists.

Aides of Mr Blair and Mr Brown protest that the range of unrelated causes in itself shows the media is gorging itself on a dish of indigestible trivia. They have a point. Many of the stories are based on conversations between journalists and marginal figures pretending to be more important than they really are. But the protestations suggest that something is rotten in the paranoid court of New Labour. "Who's doing this briefing against Gordon?" ask several of his exasperated aides. On the other side ministers ask with an equally fearful paranoia why it is that the Treasury is out to get them. One cabinet minister nervously joked last week that if he met Gordon Brown in an underground car park he would probably not come out alive. His awkward laughter conveyed the sense of someone who contemplates a grisly political death on most days of the week.

The latest eruption has been worse than usual. Normally Mr Brown brushes off the poisonous words aimed at him by pretending they do not exist. Last week he could not pull off the act of lofty disdain any longer. In a newspaper interview he declared that Tony Blair was "the best friend I've had in politics". His cabinet colleagues – "Estelle, Alan, David, Alistair and Geoff" – were all "brilliant". Mr Brown would not have liked any of this. He gets a sulky thrill from talking about tax credits, but not from getting defensively personal about his working relationships.

Those working relationships are unavoidably tense. Mr Brown has revolutionised the role of the Treasury by giving it a central role in determining how other departments spend money. This has had a wholly beneficial impact in that mighty Whitehall department, forcing senior officials to focus on a range of domestic policies for the first time in their careers. Some of the other ministers outside the Treasury, though, are becoming demented at the scale of interference. "Estelle, Alan, David, Alistair and Geoff" are told what to do by the Downing Street Policy Unit, the Downing Street Delivery Unit and quite separately by the Treasury. They are not happy with the amount of money they are getting, either. At the height of the negotiations the only obstacle, as they see it, to better services and a golden political reputation for themselves is Mr Brown and his senior adviser for many years, Ed Balls. One senior minister exclaimed after a recent exchange with Mr Balls: "That man is a bloody monetarist." Roughly translated, that means the cabinet minister failed to get the cash he wanted.

A well-sourced story in last weekend's Independent on Sunday added to the sense of crisis. The newspaper reported that Mr Blair was backing ministers who sought more money for schools and hospitals against Mr Brown's wishes to focus on tax credits for the poor.

Mr Brown and his entourage were furious for for several reasons. As they see it they have done more to prepare the ground for increases in public spending than anyone else. Sometimes Mr Blair was wary of the stealth taxes introduced in the first term, but Mr Brown took the risks partly to raise the cash for improved services. In 1999 it was Mr Blair who announced without any consultation that child poverty would be abolished in a generation. Some Brownites suspect that the announcement was dreamed up by Alastair Campbell to get a headline in The Mirror. However the unexpected announcement gave his tax credits a new sense of purpose. The credits are aimed partly at reducing child poverty. Yet last weekend Mr Brown was getting blamed for his tax credits and for showing no interest in increasing spending on public services.

In fact a defining theme of the second term for Mr Brown is the improvement of public services. To that end the Treasury is cautiously preparing the ground for tax rises later in the Parliament.

From Mr Blair's perspective the situation looks rather different. He was being attacked for showing no interest in domestic matters at the height of his hyperactive war diplomacy. There was a need to press a few buttons on the domestic front. Some of those around him point out. the Government gets no credit for their credits at a time when public services urgently need more cash.

The story highlights the suspcions, tensions, resentments and jeslousies that fuel relations between between Downing Street and the Treasury. It is emblematic in another sense too: the tensions over the actual direction of policy are not great. Both Mr Blair and Mr Brown agree that investment in public services is a priority. Both have highlighted the importance of tackling poverty. Much of the feuding relates to presentation, emphasis and the protection of individual empires.

Even the cultural differences are exaggerated. Mr Blair is portrayed as the rootless, business-friendly leader, Mr Brown as the closet socialist. But it was Mr Brown who cut corporation tax to below US levels and who praised managers at the Institute of Directors two weeks ago for "your service to our country". In spite of themselves Mr Blair and Mr Brown have a similar political outlook.

As ever, the context in which this latest eruption should be seen is Mr Blair's leadership victory in 1994. Recently Mr Blair said he wished to write a preface to a policy document being prepared by the Treasury. When Mr Brown and his aides heard about the request they were baffled. Why should he want to write the introduction? Then one of them remembered that he was Prime Minister and might have some interest in the matter. Mr Brown is often accused of being obsessively bitter about the fact that Mr Blair is PM rather than himself. The opposite is the case. His offence is sometimes to forget that Mr Blair is Prime Minister. Similarly Mr Brown is often seen as driven solely by a desire to succeed Mr Blair. In reality he is more gripped by prevailing in any disputes over policy. He is so focused that he has alienated most of the cabinet and many of those who work in Downing Street, all would have been potential allies in a leadership contest.

Still Mr Brown wants his chance to succeed. There are rumours that he has demanded from Mr Blair a date when he plans to depart. His most senior ministerial allies have expressed alarm at his occasional unrestrained fury over the leadership. They have urged him to calm down for his own good.

Most Blairite ministers do not forsee a Shakespearean denoument in which Mr Blair sacks Mr Brown. "They are still linked by an umbilical cord," said one at the height of the drama last week. Mr Brown also has strong cabinet allies. In a leadership contest John Prescott and Clare Short are likely to be his main backers. Such a combination would take some beating.

That is, if there is to be a contest. Until there is one, the volcano will erupt every few months.