Byers resignation: How a trusted outrider for the New Labour project was derailed by his own misadventure

When friends asked Stephen Byers on Sunday how he was, he replied with a smile: "I am still here!" It had become a familiar question and answer in recent months, as newspapers speculated almost daily that Mr Byers would soon be sacked.

Despite the brave face he showed to friends, Mr Byers was already thinking hard about whether he should still be here. A two-week parliamentary recess gave him time to reflect. The question his friends had asked illustrated his plight: it was as if he was suffering from a terminal disease, and that it was only a matter of time.

He requested a meeting with Tony Blair on Monday morning and said he wanted to quit for the Government's sake. The Prime Minister had not planned a reshuffle this week, but did not seek to dissuade him. The two men kept their secret to themselves when Mr Byers and senior officials met Mr Blair at 4pm to discuss his department's bid for more money in the Government's spending review.

Mr Byers wanted to delay the announcement for a day so that he could tell family and friends. As Mr Blair and Mr Byers discussed the timing, they realised how hopeless the Transport Secretary's plight had become. They had to ensure that the resignation did not clash with the long-awaited statement about the future of the Dome, so that the Government could not be accused of trying to "bury bad news" –- the phrase that will be engraved on his political epitaph.

Originally, Mr Byers had hoped to soldier on until the Commons summer recess begins in July. But, last weekend, there was another crop of damaging headlines about an attack on the Government's 10-year transport plan by the Commons Transport Select Committee. The plan was not his; he had inherited it from John Prescott, his predecessor, but most of the headlines mentioned "Byers", not "Prescott".

Mr Byers already knew his time was almost up. But it was another example of the "drip, drip" effect which has barely stopped since it was revealed last October that Jo Moore, his special adviser, sent an e-mail on 11 September saying it would be a good day to "bury bad news". When the media did not get Ms Moore's blood, it wanted Mr Byers'.

The irony is that Mr Byers was, in many ways, a product of a media-dominated age of politics. The former law lecturer at Newcastle Polytechnic was one of the few local councillors to make a national reputation. He cultivated the media as chairman of the education committee of the Association of Metropolitan Authorities and continued the courtship when he became MP for Wallsend in 1992.

Mr Byers and his friend Alan Milburn, who became MP for Darlington in the same year, were tipped as the "Blair and Brown" of their generation. Mr Milburn is still a runner in the future leadership stakes, while Mr Byers finds his once-promising career in ruins at 49.

He rose up the Labour ladder, occasionally becoming too confident for his own good. Describing himself as an "outrider for the Blair project," he speculated to journalists in Blackpool that Labour might break its link with the unions. The media expected a frenzy, but Mr Blair was remarkably relaxed about the affair. As a fully paid-up Blairite, Mr Byers was allowed to get away with things that other people would not. It was a pattern that was to repeat itself and damage both men in recent months.

Mr Byers became Schools Standards Minister in 1997, where he was regarded as one of the success stories of the Blair Government. But some ministers say that some initiatives did not prove as good as they looked, such as education action zones, which failed to bring in the hoped-for private sector money.

He joined the Cabinet in 1998 as Chief Secretary to the Treasury. Gordon Brown wanted Mr Milburn but, according to the Whitehall grapevine, Mr Blair gave him Mr Byers to remind the Chancellor who was boss.

Like some other prominent Blairites, Mr Byers has had a prickly relationship with the Chancellor. He was one of the few Cabinet ministers with the courage to stand up to him, notably when he took over at the Department of Trade and Industry, after Peter Mandelson resigned, and proceeded to talk up the benefits of the euro, which angered the Chancellor.

Mr Byers won mixed reviews at the DTI. His pro-euro statements probably ensured he was moved after last year's general election, since Mr Blair wanted fresh faces at the departments involved in European policy.

Mr Byers would have liked to stay at DTI or to become Education Secretary, a job he believed was his when Mr Blair asked him to accompany him to a school just before the election.

Instead, to his surprise, he was sent to a scaled-down Department of Transport, Local Government and the Regions, the job which Jack Straw expected to get.

Mr Byers knuckled down to his task and, despite the many problems in his in-tray, made progress. His decision to put Railtrack into administration boosted his stock among Labour backbenchers, who jokingly called him "Red Steve." The backbench support played an important role in propping up Mr Byers when he was under threat in recent months.

However, his fate was probably sealed by the failure to sack Ms Moore over her e-mail. Ironically, it was not Mr Byers' call. The decision was taken by Mr Blair, who was reluctant to punish Ms Moore for one mistake. One friend of Mr Byers said last night: "He wanted to get rid of her. The powers that be wouldn't let him."

Perhaps Mr Byers would still be in his post today if Ms Moore had gone immediately. She finally departed in February. The civil war at the department, which also involved Martin Sixsmith, the director of communications, inflicted terminal damage on Mr Byers.

Mr Sixsmith was a bad enemy for Mr Byers to make; he fought a faultless campaign to clear his name, and Mr Byers was repeatedly accused of lying to Parliament over the affair. Ironically, Mr Sixsmith outlasted Mr Byers: he remains on the Government payroll until the end of this month.

The one-time rising star became the most unpopular minister since opinion polls began. And yet Mr Byers proved remarkably resilient.

"The great thing is to ensure that the pressure doesn't then become stress," he told political correspondents over lunch two weeks ago. But even that event provoked another media frenzy, over his fairly unremarkable comments that legislation might be needed to call a single currency referendum.

The episode showed that it had become impossible for him to do his job. "He couldn't say a word about policy," one Blair aide said last night. "The media decided that he was the story and it wouldn't let go."

Could Mr Byers come back because he jumped before he was pushed? The danger is that he would "become the story" again.

Mr Blair is desperate to change the image that the Government is obsessed by "spin", so he is unlikely to bring back the man who became the living embodiment of it.