What's that? you're angry about housing benefit? I'll just transfer you to my colleague Steve...

Just a quick observation as I'm rather tired, but... I noticed with some surprise the other day that Steve Webb, the Minister for Pensions, seems to have been allocated the unenviable responsibility of putting his name to parliamentary answers on housing benefit. What, I ask myself, does housing benefit have to do with pensions? It certainly doesn't feature in his list of ministerial responsibilities, unless you class it under 'pensions and related benefits', which seems like a bit of a stretch. Given the government's rhetoric pitting housing benefit claimants against 'average working families', you'd think it might fit better under 'employment and related benefits', which is Chris Grayling's area.

However, Steve Webb does have one distinguishing feature that Chris Grayling lacks: he's a Lib Dem. Perhaps I'm just being overly cynical, but I can't help wondering if it is quite deliberate that one of the government's most widely-criticised attacks on the welfare state is being fronted by the DWP's only Lib Dem minister. Steve Webb was the party's work and pensions spokesperson before the election, and I'm fairly confident he would have been speaking out against the current changes as strongly as anyone had he still been in opposition. Instead, he's forced to defend them. It does make me wonder whether the widely-noted tactic of pushing Danny Alexander in front of the cameras to announce unpopular things whilst hiding George Osborne in a box extends to other departments as well. I can well imagine the existence of a concerted Tory strategy to make Lib Dems the fall guys as far as possible - with Lib Dem ministers happy to take nominal responsibility for controversial areas in the heady anticipation of having influence.

I can equally well imagine that I'm barking up completely the wrong tree here. But either way, I can't help feeling that the Tories are playing a far cleverer game than the Lib Dems in terms of coalition politics.

UPDATE: Ironic that the day after I wrote this, Nick Clegg is left carrying the can at PMQs on the day of the student fees march, resulting in a predictable 30-minute mauling. Obviously, Cameron has a pretty good alibi, being in China and all. But I can't imagine the Tories being too upset about this. Tuition fees is another area where campaigners and the media seem to have done the Tories' job for them by aiming their fire so exclusively at the Lib Dems. I know it's easy and it's rational, because of the narrative of betrayal, but it's unfortunate that it's led to those who are actually the leading party of government - who never opposed raising fees in the first place and would clearly have done this anyway with or without the Lib Dems - getting off scot free.