They are playing down as too soon suggestions they will be promoted into the Cabinet to replace David Clark minister for public office

They are playing down as "too soon" suggestions they will be promoted into the Cabinet to replace David Clark, minister for public office, or Mr Strang "Peter Mandelson will be the first in," said one minister.. Those on the move after the first year in office could include Alan Milburn, the health minister, Stephen Byers, schools minister, and Helen Liddell, economic secretary to the Treasury. Mr Robinson's private finance initiative (PFI) tasks would fit in better with the Department of Trade and Industry than Mr Prescott's Department of the Environment, Transport and the Regions, although there was speculation that it would be doubly embarrassing to have Mr Robinson - believed to have been on the board of some Maxwell companies - at the DTI when it published its report on the Maxwell empire.The lower ranks are gearing up for a big reshuffle, largely involving a round of musical chairs rather than sackings. Newhouse's children are not keen to play big parts in the business.

So nephew Jonathan Newhouse, who looks after the international magazine division, is tipped to step into Si's shoes looking after the whole magazine division. He will arrive at Conde Nast headquarters in New York before dawn and is famous for prowling the building, firing memos from yellow legal pads that wrongfoot and instil fear in employees. Unlike better-known magnates, Newhouse has a reputation for political neutrality and freedom for his editors.Brother Donald runs the newspaper division and the sale of Random House has been interpreted by some as the family looking to make a neat transfer of power to the next generation. The decision to sell Random House is ascribed to the same part of his character that likes to create waves and shock.

Editors who thought themselves close to him have read about their sackings in rival publications. New York wags estimate that trendy eateries usually have half their covers paid for by 'Uncle Si' and his generous expense accounts.Yet this soft-spoken, generous man can be as hard as nails. It includes 29 newspapers, Conde Nast magazines, until yesterday the publishing firms of Random House, Knopf and Crown, the New Yorker magazine and American TV cable franchises with 1 million subscribers.His editors are famously well treated and on appointment often receive a six-figure personal cheque from Newhouse to help buy a Manhattan apartment. His personal worth has been put at $4.5bn (pounds 2.7bn) by Forbes magazine, two places ahead of Rupert Murdoch in its list of the world's rich.He inherited a middling newspaper business from his father Sam in 1979 and turned it into a $13bn empire which to this day is owned by the Newhouse family. His old apartment on the upper East Side of Manhattan had stairs going to the windows so the dog could look out. Yet, without the personality traits of other media moguls, Newhouse is successful indeed. In fact, he is the grandson of East European immigrants who spoke no English and at just a little over five feet tall is not anyone's idea of patrician.

And for a man who owns GQ and Vogue, he is reputed to be something of a shabby dresser. In company he is known to be quietly spoken and unimpressive. The great love of his life is reported to be his dog He holds parties for it and owners of similar dogs. The most famous of his magazines, like the New Yorker and Vanity Fair, chronicle the goings-on of the political and cultural elite of America and the world, so you would imagine the man who owns them could be lifted from their pages, writes Paul McCann. The transaction must be approved by US regulators.Latest chapter, page 23. To look at his magazines, and his shortened first name, Si Newhouse, 70, seems like a patrician member of America's old-established upper class.

From magazines Mr Mohn's progress led to the music industry, followed by television, films and the so-called "new media", including on-line services.The purchase by a German conglomerate of Random House, publisher of Robert Harris's fictional oeuvre about the global triumph of Nazi Germany that did not happen, Fatherland - is certain to raise concern about Bertelsmann's tightening grip on US publishing. In 1962, it went international, setting up the first book club in Spain.In 1969 it made its first major acquisition in the German magazine market, taking a controlling stake in publishers Gruner & Jahrand suddenly owning bright publications, such as Stern and the women's magazine Brigitte, as well as weeklies in Britain, the US and Austria. Within four years, the Bertelsmann clubs had 1 million members. Most of its shares are owned by a charity, which controls the weekly Die Zeit.Solid, reliable and conservative are the epithets used in connection with the company set up in 1835 which now employs 60,000 people in 50 countries. Not a lot happened in Gutersloh until 1946, when its owner, Reinhard Mohn who still cycles to head office in his home town, returned from a Prisoner-of-War camp in Kansas From America Mr Mohn had brought one big idea: book clubs. Conde Nast titles include Vanity Fair, GQ Magazine and Vogue.