Leaders fight to standstill over Dome

Blair blamed Hague for Dome

By BBC News Online's political correspondent Nick Assinder

Tony Blair has admitted that he personally insisted the Millennium Dome should go ahead.

As the row surrounding the beleaguered project dominated question time in the Commons, the prime minister told William Hague it was "certainly true that I said it should proceed".

His confession delighted Mr Hague, who immediately claimed that it was he, not Dome minister Lord Falconer, who should take the rap for the project.

But it surprised few MPs who remember Mr Blair's enthusiasm for the project immediately after the last general election.

And, not for the first time, the judgement was that the bout between the two leaders had failed to move the argument forward.

Mr Hague is certainly embarrassing the prime minister with his attacks on the Dome - which many see as a symbol for the New Labour government.

But Mr Blair can always throw back the fact that it was the previous

It is certainly true that I said it should proceed

Tony Blair

Tory government which set up the project.

And, once again, the two men went through the list of allegations during their question time clash.

No admission

Mr Hague seized on a newspaper report which claims to have been an account of the cabinet meeting in which the prime minister insisted the project should continue.

"Last week you tried to blame everyone but yourself for the Dome disaster.

"Now we've had a full account of your cabinet meeting, can you confirm that the member of the cabinet who insisted the project should proceed and said it could even make money was you?"

Mr Blair confessed, declaring: "It is certainly true that I said that it should proceed.

"It is also true, however, as we demonstrated conclusively last week, that the funding for the Dome, the financial management of the Dome and the site itself were all agreed when you were a member of the Cabinet committee that agreed it.

"We still haven't had your admission that you were a member of that Cabinet committee." And he didn't get one then either.

Fatal blow

The two continued to hammer at each other over the issue - with Mr Hague claiming he only went to the opening party to laugh at the government - but there was a feeling that the row, a bit like the Dome itself, had no future.

Mr Blair continued to insist that the Tories were responsible for launching, and then supporting, the project. And he told Mr Hague to take his bandwagon and drive it off somewhere else.

And Mr Hague continued to claim Mr Blair was using his friend Lord Falconer as a shield for his own mistake. But neither scored a fatal blow.

Many now believe the two have fought themselves to a standstill over the issue and are instead looking to the investigation by the public accounts committee to draw real blood over the dome disaster.