Tony Blair strides onto stage on the dot at 9.30am with literally half the journalists still queueing up outside to get through security. Labour today are talking about the national health service, and in particular, a new pledge on screening times for breast, bowel and cervical cancer. So, by 2008, all women being checked for breast cancer will be seen by a consultant within two weeks, and all women will get the results of their smear test within seven days.
And, turning to the Tories, he says: "The future of a health service free at the point of use is at issue in this election. If you value the NHS, vote for it on May 5."
Although he has a slight cough, Mr Blair looks bronzed – as if he caught the sun over the weekend.
9.45am: The health secretary, John Reid, says the Tories don't want to talk about their plans for a £1.2bn subsidy to people who are reasonably well-off and would already be going private.
Melanie Johnson, a health minister, reveals she was diagnosed with breast cancer in 2001, and she says the anxiety on receiving an initial positive diagnosis is almost as bad as the illness itself.
She says she's therefore proud to be part of a government that will ensure all women will be seen by a consultant within two weeks of referral by a GP.
Mr Blair steps in to take questions, and says the Tory sums do not add up. "We are the only party with a credible programme for government."
"You've got the big picture there," chips in Mr Reid. "That's what I'm good at," smiles Mr Blair.
10am: Adam Boulton wonders, like me, where the PM got his tan. "Sitting outside, yesterday, working," says Mr Blair.
Channel Four's Jon Snow is barracked for getting his question muddled on whether there should be a live TV debate between Mr Blair and Mr Brown – meaning Mr Howard. "Give the award back," shouts a fellow hack, uncharitably. "Because this debate is about policies," responds Mr Blair finally, when the laughter dies down.
ITN's Nick Robinson picks up the theme of the Tory "threat" to the NHS, and says their patient passport subsidy of £1.2bn is only around 1% of the NHS budget, so surely that would not "signal the destruction of the NHS"? "It's a significant amount of money, and it's going to increase pressure on the NHS," says the PM.
10.15am: Colin Brown of the Independent asks how Mr Blair's own health is? "My health is fine, thank you very much," says the PM. The Guardian's Mike White asks, on pensions, if Labour would means-test a future "citizen's pension", and also, why there is so much focus on breast cancer and so little on prostrate cancer – is it not a bid for the women's vote? Mr Blair tells him to wait for the Turner report on pensions in the next parliament, whilst Mr Reid says the measures on bowel cancer are aimed at removing the stigma men feel regarding rectal cancer.
Andrew Neil of the Spectator says that in Scotland the NHS reforms have not been implemented, and waiting times have risen. Mr Blair says some reform programmes are in the pipeline in Scotland.
On possible scrapping of a referendum in the UK on the EU constitution, if the French vote no, Mr Blair says: "I've always said, we'll have a vote on the constitution. It doesn't matter what other countries do." A seemingly explicit statement, except when asked what would happen if there wasn't a constitution? If there is no constitution, there's nothing there to vote on, says the PM.
10.25am: "Forget the polls, the polls are all over the place – in marginal constituencies this is a very tight battle," Mr Blair tells the Mirror. Amusingly, he also cannot remember who the Tory health spokesman is.
Almost an hour in, and the first Labour press conference of the second week comes to an end.
