It's a messy business, and Labour has been embarrassed in spectacular fashion. What with the cost of bringing spouses and secretaries on foreign trips, refurbishing ministerial apartments to the tune of thousands of pounds and Blair's designer kitchen at No 10, the Tories have seized - with a singular disregard for hypocrisy - on issue where they can score points against the government.
In the Commons this week, the Tories lined up the Foreign Secretary, Robin Cook, for a fall. By tabling questions to establish whether he had sacked his former diary secretary, Anne Bullen, in order to give the job to his lover, Gaynor Regan, they sensed an easy political scalp.
They succeeded to a degree, forcing Mr Cook to issue a statement admitting he had "considered" appointing Mrs Regan, his constituency secretary, to the post, but dismissed the idea on the grounds that he could have left himself open to a charge of nepotism.
The twist in the tail was the portrayal of Ms Bullen as a loyal and efficient secretary one minute to a "dyed-in-the-wool Tory" with a reputation for being difficult the next. Ms Bullen, who was taken on at the Foreign Office by the former Tory foreign secretary, Douglas Hurd, began the week as an exemplary civil servant who cried when she was told that Mr Cook wanted her to leave.
Nothing wrong with wanting to work alongside one's lover, or making changes to the personnel in the office. Yet in a number of days the former working relationship between Mr Cook and Ms Bullen has descended into a slanging match.
"Sources" close to the Foreign Secretary said Ms Bullen had created a "poisonous atmosphere" in the office. "She was a bit of a snob," these sources said, "who probably didn't like it that Robin Cook was not a member of the officer class."
Other allegations, of rudeness and insensitivity by Mr Cook towards Queen Elizabeth and Princess Diana, were angrily rebutted by Buckingham Palace and by Mr Cook. Buckingham Palace came to his aid yesterday when Queen Elizabeth's spokesman dismissed reports that she felt "abandoned" by Mr Cook during a tour of Pakistan and India last year when he returned to England, to visit Mrs Regan, it was claimed.
Labour has had a tough time of it in recent weeks. With rows over the refurbishment of Nos 10 and 11 Downing Street, the redecoration of Margaret Beckett's apartment and other residences - at a cost of £825,523 - and Lord Irvine's ludicrously expensive wallpaper in his offices, the party has lurched from one embarrassment to another.
The ease with which Labour has wrapped itself in the perks of power has come as a surprise to card-carrying socialists who believed they would be different from the Tories. Nearly nine months into power Labour is facing accusations of nepotism, lavish spending and a definite lack of judgment. Even the Liberal Democrats leader, Paddy Ashdown, who accused the Tories of breathtaking hypocrisy this week over their attack on Labour's "trips for totty", wants the government to take a hard look at itself.
Generally supportive of Tony Blair, Ashdown warned him: "If you really want to re-establish trust in politics, as the government is saying it wants to do, then a certain frugality, perhaps even meanness, about the amount of taxpayers' money a government spends on itself ought to be appropriate."
For its part, Labour has been learning some hard lessons about politics in opposition and politics in government. Never mind that the Tories were sleazy in government: Labour has had to defend itself against similar accusations. And as the saying goes, where there's smoke there's fire. The fact remains that spending £36,639.50 of taxpayers' money on bringing spouses and partners on official trips does not go down well with the opposition. The Tories published a dossier called Snouts in the Trough, the Indulgence Index, which detailed £11.46 million the government had spent on itself. Mr Blair was forced to defend spending nearly £126,000 on improvements to No 10 and No 11, saying his family used the flat at No 11 as a home and the cost was entirely in line with money spent by John Major's government.
Labour might be able to come up with the figures to defend itself, but the perception remains that they have been carried away on a tide of extravagance. For New Labour, which has invested so much in its image, a touch of frugality could go a long way.