Nothing in Andrew Smith's plodding ministerial career foreshadowed the drama of his leaving it. His slightly premature departure from the Department of Work and Pensions on September 6th plunged Tony Blair's plans for a cabinet reshuffle this week into turmoil, while unleashing a particularly virulent bout of infighting between Blairites and Brownites. Had Mr Smith gone quietly at the appointed time, nobody would have thought much about it. He was a failure, but not a notable one. Although decent and moderately able, he never managed to get any kind of grip on Britain's gathering pensions crisis. If ever there was a minister destined to be spending more time with his family, it seemed to be Mr Smith. But for one thing: Mr Smith is the creature of the chancellor, Gordon Brown, and Mr Brown sees the department over which Mr Smith nominally presided as a dependent province of the Treasury. Mr Brown thus interpreted rumours of Mr Smith's imminent sacking as a prime ministerial assault on his fiefdom and an example of Mr Blair's bad faith.
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