Sack the chancellor. Cherie Blair's repeated advice to her husband

I'm counting the seconds until this weekends transmission of Channel Four's "The Rise and Fall of Tony Blair". The leaked contents almost promise that it must be a disappointment, as nothing can surely live up to this amount of hype.

I've already posted on how Blair knew that Bush had no plans for how to deal with post war Iraq, but further leaks suggest that there's even more:

· Staff at No 10 felt like "they were children in a dysfunctional relationship".

· Treasury officials believed it was "the kiss of death" to cooperate with No 10.

· Mr Blair regretted making a compromise with Mr Brown over foundation hospitals in November, 2003.

· The prime minister did not know on the day of the vote on tuition fees in 2004 if Mr Brown's supporters would back him.

· Alan Milburn, his party chairman, regarded Mr Blair's decision to preannounce his own resignation as "mad".

· Mr Brown rejected an offer in 2001 to take Britain into the euro in return for the premiership, telling his cabinet colleague Clare Short: "It's improper and anyway he breaks his word".

· Mr Blair believed the problem with Alastair Campbell was that "he hated the media".

However, the biggest leak this morning is that Cherie wanted Blair to fire Brown. The comments come from Barry Cox, a family friend who has known the couple for 30 years, and he claims that at one point Blair told him that he was going to fire Brown. Cox is close enough to the Blairs to have holidayed with them, so it's safe to say he's in the inner circle.

In an interview, he said: "Tony used to take the line, 'Look, it's entirely legitimate for Gordon to want to be prime minister'. And he would try to be understanding about it and lay it off. But within the last year he did begin to believe the worst of Gordon Brown". Mr Cox's claims about the bitterness between Mr Blair and Mr Brown are echoed by Matthew Taylor, a close adviser to the prime minister, who said staff at No 10 felt like "they were children in a dysfunctional relationship where mum and dad are too busy arguing to ever talk to the kids".

"You'd be sitting waiting for a decision and all that you could hear was the crockery being thrown around the kitchen," said Mr Taylor.

Former advisers and ministers admit that the tension between the Treasury and Downing Street was ever-present and affected the way Labour governed.

I am also highly suspicious that all this is coming out, with family friends of the Blairs suddenly speaking out, just as Blair is about to step down and Brown is finally assuming the mantle of Prime Minister. Surely the Blair camp have Labour's best interests at heart and couldn't possibly be attempting to undermine the new Labour leader? Only a cynic would read it that way surely?

I am bound to be disappointed when this is finally transmitted this Saturday, as so far it seems that revelation will trip over revelation...

Click title for full article.

Tags: Blair, Brown, Labour, New Labour, The Rise and Fall of Tony Blair, Cherie