Delay May general election, says Hague

Mr Hague is stepping up attacks on the government

Tory leader William Hague has urged Prime Minister Tony Blair to delay calling a general election while the foot-and-mouth outbreak rages.

For the first time, the opposition leader publicly called on the prime minister to postpone the anticipated 3 May poll, saying this "would be putting party before country".

Mr Blair will decide election dat this weekend

On a visit to the affected village of Hawes in Wensleydale, North Yorkshire, he said that if he was prime minister he "would be concentrating on fighting this disease and not the election".

But Commons leader Margaret Beckett has hinted the local elections will go ahead on 3 May - increasing the chances that Mr Blair will ignore Conservative demands and call a general election for the same day.

Poll dilemma

Until now Mr Hague has confined himself to urging the government to bring in legislation enabling it to delay the county council elections.

Many Labour MPs have urged Mr Blair to stick to 3 May and their case has been boosted by a poll in Thursday's Times suggesting the party has 50% support, 19 points ahead of the Conservatives.

Despite Mrs Beckett's comments to the House, a possible postponement to 7 June is being talked about at Westminster.

I would not call a general election in these circumstances when we have a national epidemic that is out of control

William Hague

The timing will depend on whether Mr Blair considers enough has been done to control the outbreak.

He is expected to make his final decision over the weekend at Chequers.

Mrs Beckett told the Commons that postponing the county elections would give out a "very negative signal" - one the tourist industry fears will drive away even more foreign visitors.

Provided rural communities took sensible precautions, there was no reason why normal life should not continue, said Mrs Beckett.

"Certainly it has been the government's view for some time that to suspend the county council elections would give a very strong and a very negative signal."

Shadow Commons leader Angela Browning asked what help county council candidates who were farmers would receive.

The prime minister is focussing on foot and mouth almost to the exclusion of everything else

No 10 spokesman

She said three candidates in her Tiverton and Honiton constituency were "restricted now to their farms".

"They will clearly want to contact the electorate by phone," said Mrs Browning, arguing that this would incur election expenses.

She asked whether electoral returning officers would distribute postal votes on a parish-by- parish basis.

Mrs Beckett said: "Electoral returning officers already have considerable powers and they were already, before there was any question of a foot-and-mouth outbreak, under advice to draw to people's attention the greater availability of postal voting."

Andrew Robathan (Con, Blaby) called on the government to schedule a debate on the issue of whether or not an election should be called while foot-and-mouth disease continued to ravage rural areas.

The prime minister's official spokesman said on Thursday: "The prime minister is focussing on foot and mouth almost to the exclusion of everything else.

"He continues to listen to what people say about the locals."