TODAY'S edition of The Northern Echo - Tony Blair's local paper - features a timely and honest assessment of his five years as Prime Minister.

It provides evidence of achievement but also of disappointment. Progress has been made but it is tempered by frustration.

More money is being delivered into schools - but it has come with increased bureaucracy.

The National Health Service is finally getting the investment it so desperately needs - but change is agonisingly slow and the challenge of delivering the extra doctors and nurses is daunting; some would say impossible.

Crime has fallen - but the perception remains that Britain is an increasingly unsafe place.

The economy is solid but transport is in a mess - no buts.

To be fair, for a Prime Minister well into a second term, it could be a lot worse.

That owes as much to the weakness of the opposition as it does to the strength of the Government.

In an interview with The Northern Echo today, Mr Blair openly admits that he shares the sense of frustration that progress has not been quicker.

The clock is ticking loudly and a difficult few days lie ahead with forecasts for the mayoral elections containing the potential for embarrassment here in the North-East.

The message on the fifth anniversary of New Labour is clear: Delivery must be speeded up.

We also hope that Mr Blair does not underestimate the danger of spin. In today's interview, he more or less shrugs it off as a figment of the media's imagination, and that is worrying.

Of course, a modern government has to be professionally equipped to deal with a 24-hour media agenda. But there is a difference between responding to requests for information and manipulating that information.

We believe Tony Blair to be an honest, caring, decent man. Honesty, above all else, is what we want from his Government.

It is time to deliver - and it is time to give it to the people straight