Wheeled out for yet another crisis

Alistair Darling tells an after-dinner tale that points up his low-key style - and a knack for shifting the blame which could prove crucial in his new job at the transport department.

Soon after he became Social Security Secretary, a hard-up constituent rolled up to his advice surgery in Edinburgh clutching a letter from the dole office which began: "The Secretary of State has decided to cut your benefit . . ."

"Who is this ****!" the man asked. "D'yae know him?" Mr Darling instantly replied that he knew of him, and would take up the complaint first thing in the morning.

A quick thinker and reliable performer, his distinctive silver hair is a familiar sight in the nation's television and radio studios whenever the Government is in trouble.

He is wheeled out to defend Labour on issues which go well beyond his ministerial brief because he is trusted by Tony Blair to put the party's case robustly and without slip-ups.

During last year's general election campaign he fronted a series of press conferences while bigger names such as John Prescott and Jack Straw were kept away from the cameras.

Mr Darling's Scottish accent belies the fact that he was born in London, and settled in Scotland only at the age of 12 when his family moved there. He went to seven different primary schools, an experience which he says "made me not afraid of change". Later he was a boarder at Scotland's oldest independent school, Loretto, before reading law at Aberdeen University.

A Scottish advocate, his skills at mastering complex briefs and putting reasoned arguments have served him well in both his legal and political careers. Now aged 48, he has been an MP since 1987. His political leanings have tended to go with the flow - from "sensible Left" to firmly New Labour - as the party has changed.

As a municipal socialist in the early Eighties, he backed fashionable Leftwing causes including the creation by councils of "nuclear-free zones". In 1987 he flouted secrecy laws by reading out in public sections of Peter Wright's banned book Spycatcher. And he has changed his stance on Scottish devolution from sceptic to supporter.

Perhaps most cynically of all, he shaved off his grey beard when facial hair went out of fashion in the Labour ranks - despite reports that his wife Margaret wanted him to keep it.

She lives in Edinburgh with the couple's two children, both at secondary school, while Mr Darling divides his time between his family and his job in London.

While he is known as a firm supporter of Chancellor Gordon Brown, he maintains good relations with the Blairite camp.

His efforts propelled him straight into the Cabinet when Labour came to power in 1997, first as Chief Treasury Secretary then as replacement to sacked Social Security Secretary Harriet Harman the following year.

Since rebranded as the Work and Pensions Secretary, he has proved a safe pair of hands and even avoided most of the flak for his department's biggest public relations disaster - the move, in 1999, to raise the basic state pension by only 75p. Tony Blair later apologised for the decision.

David Williams writes: Mr Darling's appointment was welcomed by transport experts. Tony Travers, director of the Greater London Group at the London School of Economics, said: "Unlike Byers he will be seen to bring the virtues of straightforwardness and decency to the job."

Stephen Glaister, Professor of Transport at Imperial College, said: "Mr Darling's Treasury background could be a major advantage."

Julia Lalla-Maharajh, executive director of transport at London First, said: "A critical measure of his success will be if he persuades Gordon Brown to give more money to transport."

Edmund King, executive director of the RAC Foundation, added: "Mr Darling has already shown he is an efficient manager and that is what the Department of Transport now needs."