Tony Blair achieved his desired aim of shifting the election battleground onto public services yesterday but immediately found his record under fire from health and education chiefs.

On the day he launched Labour's campaign slogan for the final week of the campaign, "Schools and hospitals first", his record on health and education was severely criticised by leaders in both public services.

Dr Peter Hawker, leader of the British Medical Association's consultants' group said that standards in the NHS were so bad, he wouldn't want his family to be treated by it.

This was followed by the accusation from David Hart, general secretary of the National Association of Head Teachers, that teacher shortages in Britain's schools made England look like a third world country.

The prime minister had earlier signalled a public services offensive for the final week of the election when he attended a poster launch accompanied by NHS staff carrying the schools and hospitals first message.

Blair committed his party to substantial investment in public services but admitted at a morning news conference that on the NHS "there is a lot of pain out there, a lot of anxiety; people waiting too long".

William Hague temporarily moved away from one of his core campaign themes of saving the pound after criticism from senior Tories that the election campaign was not covering enough of the big issues.

Speaking on a visit to a GP's surgery, the Tory leader said that voters had a choice between a government that "by its own admission had failed and would fail again and a Conservative Party that will create a modern NHS, built on respect and authority for doctors and nurses and efficiency".

However, John Clare, the Telegraph's education writer describes the Tories education plans as the "least convincing" of the main parties and says some of their policies are "half-baked, if baked at all".

A further blow to the Conservatives comes in the free market Economist magazine which will today declare for Labour for the first time since 1964.