MICHAEL Howard dramatically wrote off the Tories' chances across much of the North yesterday insisting: "We can win the election without winning there".

In an interview with The Northern Echo, the Conservative leader did not deny that the Liberal Democrats were now the main challenger to Labour in the North.

Mr Howard admitted that the Conservatives' recent election results in Northern towns and cities spoke for themselves.

And he said: "I would love to win seats in Newcastle and Liverpool, and other big cities in the North, but we can win the General Election without doing that."

Mr Howard's surprise comments delighted the LibDems, who have insisted they - not the Tories - are now the alternative to Labour in the North.

Chris Rennard, the Lib- Dems election guru, said: "It's honest to admit that the Tories have given up in most of Britain's cities."

The Tory leader's remarks flew in the face of his insistence, on succeeding Iain Duncan Smith last year, that there were no no-go areas for his party.

Mr Howard strode into Labour's inner-city heartlands, stating: "The Labour party feel they own the votes of working class communities. They do not."

Since then, the Tories have suffered a string of by-election defeats in urban areas, including a disastrous fourth-place in Hartlepool last week.

On the eve of this week's conference, Mr Howard warned that his party was in freefall in Northern towns and cities.

Tony Travers, Britain's leading expert in local politics, suggested the LibDems were now the main opposition force to Labour in those urban areas. He contrasted the strong local support enjoyed by the Tories in 1978 - the year before the party last won back power from Labour - with the stark reality today.

In 1978, the Tories boasted 33 councillors in Newcastle and 14 in Gateshead. Now, they do not have a single councillor in either.

Durham was another area identified where Conservative support has all but been wiped out, along with Manchester, Sheffield, York and Rochdale.

Mr Travers suggested the LibDems were "filling an opposition vacuum because the Conservatives are not capable of shedding their image from the 1980s".

During the interview, conducted in Mr Howard's Bournemouth hotel, the Tory leader admitted it was a great help to have an army of activists willing to knock on doors.

But he said: "There are now a multiplicity of means of communication with people. It's not the only way."

Mr Howard insisted his party now had the right policies to win the election, but too few voters were aware that those policies had been adopted.

He said: "The Hartlepool by-election was a very bad result, but I agree with John Prescott who says by-elections are not the best guide to subsequent elections."