TONY BLAIR yesterday launched Labour's election manifesto, promising not to raise the basic or top rates of income tax - but refusing to rule out an increase in National Insurance contributions.

The Prime Minister said no party could give such a commitment, as he published the exhaustive 112-page, 23,000 word document swiftly dubbed the "more-of-the-same manifesto" by Tory leader Michael Howard.

Mr Blair urged voters to choose Labour's detailed plans to improve schools and hospitals over a "threadbare" Tory offering based on "emotion without detailed policy".

Mr Blair also put in writing, in his preface, his intention to stand down at the next election as Labour leader, while later insisting he would serve a full third term if his party was re-elected.

Hilary Armstrong, the Government Chief Whip and Durham North-West MP, said: "The most important part of the manifesto is keeping a stable economy, mortgage rates low, employment as high as possible and steady growth, so we can continue to invest in public services.

"That is critical to the North-East."

Following the manifesto launch, she returned to the North-East to head Labour's regional campaign.

She said: "We as a population in the North-East don't use private services as much as people do in the other areas.

"To have a government that is committed to making public services as good as anything you might get in the private sector is vital to the region."

Ms Armstrong said the emphasis on education was important if the region was going to be able to compete.

"In Crook and Willington, the schools are taking part in the Testbed Project where all the teaching is done through ICT (information and communication technology) - at a nursery in Crook, five-year-olds are at the level of seven-year-olds, and Ofsted says this is an exemplar for the rest of the country for the use of IT in the early years curriculum.

"The heads tell me that the technicians are absolutely critical to this - but the technicians are the people the Tories call bureaucrats and would get rid of."

She also drew attention to the pledges of more community support officers, who work alongside the police, and to new powers for parish councils and community councils.

"Parishes could employ wardens as street cleaners or to pick up on things like graffiti or broken windows," she said.

"With these sorts of measures, people feel that their neighbourhood belongs to them so they take more responsibility for it and more pride in it.

"That's what the manifesto is about."