The Conservative leader, Mr William Hague, branded the British Prime Minister, Mr Blair, "the great pretender" yesterday.
Mr Hague was launching a poster campaign which claims that Labour has raised taxes and failed to deliver better public services.
But as Mr Blair set out his stall for a second term, the Liberal Democrat leader, Mr Charles Kennedy, ridiculed the renewed Tory promise to cut taxes and improve services. And a leading trade unionist accused the Conservatives of "hypocrisy" over public-sector pay and staff shortages.
Mr Hague remained on the back foot as a new poll found a majority viewing his party as "right wing" and as Central Office dismissed a year-old article by the Conservative candidate for Birmingham Edgebaston suggesting the press and public see the party as a "lost cause".
Mr Hague launched a new poster campaign, under the slogan: "You've paid the tax, so where's all the money gone?"
Each poster shows a disgruntled voter under the slogan, followed by questions targeting the government's performance on education, health, law and order, and transport: "So where are the teachers? So where's your operation? So where are the police? And so where are the trains?"
The Tory leader repeated his promise that a Conservative government could cut taxes by £8 billion within three years. "People aren't fooled any more by Tony Blair," Mr Hague declared. "They have paid the tax and they want to know where all the money has gone. That is a great part of what the next election is going to be about."
However, Mr Kennedy countered: "People know that you can't get something for nothing. The Conservatives are trying to imply they can reduce public spending and cut taxes and increase the vital public services people care about. Pull the other one."
Mr Blair, meanwhile, told an audience in Bristol that Britain would only continue moving in the right direction "through choice, not chance" by choosing economic stability and continued investment in the public services.
Having suffered only an 11-minute delay in his train journey from London, the Prime Minister attacked the Tories for their "botched privatisation of the railways" and renewed his appeal for time to see through change.
"Of course it takes time," he said. "Twenty years of neglect - and in the case of some services more than 20 years - was never going to be put right in one term of office."
Two women and one man were arrested after throwing rotten fruit at Mr Blair during an otherwise peaceful protest about continuing sanctions on Iraq.