Election focus now on leadership

Critics of negative campaigning are not impressed

With a week of campaigning to go, it's official, the election is about leadership.

Labour has unveiled its most personal attack yet on William Hague.

A new poster shows the Conservative leader's face with Lady Thatcher's hair.

And the former Prime Minister John Major makes a speech in which he's expected to praise William Hague as a "shrewd straight-talking Yorkshire man" while accusing Tony Blair and Labour of having "lost their moral compass".

William Hague: Association with Lady Thatcher may damage his ratings

And throughout Tuesday the party leaders have been conceding that, while the policies they trumpet are important, people are also entitled to cast their vote having considered the leadership qualities of the men at the top.

William Hague was asked at the Tory London news conference whether such a concentration on personalities might not backfire for him.

After all, the polls seem to suggest he has a mountain to climb if he's to overhaul Tony Blair in the popularity stakes.

Mr Hague said it was "hilarious" that Tony Blair claimed he did not want the cult of personality to be a part of the election campaign.

He said he was getting a "tremendously good reaction" from people around the country, among those undecided how to vote as well as Tory supporters.

Speaking at the launch of the poster, actor and Labour supporter Richard Wilson quipped:

"They say William Hague is an old head on young shoulders. That's true, it is Margaret Thatcher's head," he said.

But the Liberal Democrat, Charles Kennedy, expressed his unease about the level of negative campaigning in this election.

Euro-scepticism attacked

To add to his woes the Tory leader was criticised on Tuesday for his plans to renegotiate the Treaty of Nice by the former Conservative cabinet minister Lord Brittan.

The proposal, which is in the Tory election manifesto, is "neither realistic nor in our interests", according to Lord Brittan, who was a former trade and industry secretary, under Margaret Thatcher, and former vice-president of the European Commission.

"We have stood up for and successfully defended the British veto on tax harmonisation and many other things," he said.

"To say that the election is the last chance to stop the euro implies that the British people are not going to be able to recognise any skulduggery if there is any.

"And it is incredibly defensive to say that the referendum cannot be won by the 'No' vote if the 'No' vote wants to win it," he said.