Tony Blair goes into tomorrow's general election confident of a Labour victory but still publicly nervous about the size of his majority in the new House of Commons.
And Iraq is haunting him into the final hours of the 2005 campaign, with relatives of troops killed in the war threatening him with legal action, and the widow of the latest British victim, Guardsman Anthony Wakefield, blaming Mr Blair for his death.
Liberal Democrats leader Charles Kennedy accused the prime minister of running away from Iraq, as he compared Mr Blair's claim that Labour defections to the Lib Dems could let the Conservatives in "by the back door" to pre-war claims that Britain faced the threat of an attack at 45 minutes' notice.
Mr Kennedy, and Conservative leader Michael Howard, sent their sympathies to Guardsman Wakefield's family, but did not blame Mr Blair for his death.
However, Mr Howard repeated his charge that there had been inadequate planning for the post-conflict situation in Iraq. And the controversy was playing strongly in Scotland, too, where SNP leader Alex Salmond said Scots could best protest against the war by voting nationalist.
The SNP and Plaid Cymru have vowed to renew efforts to have Mr Blair "impeached" over the war by tabling a fresh Commons motion on the subject in the new parliament.
And yesterday afternoon the members of 10 families of British servicemen killed in the war said they were considering the possibility of taking private prosecutions against Mr Blair and others for alleged "war crimes".
The families signed a letter which was handed in to 10 Downing Street warning they would take legal action unless Mr Blair agreed to a public inquiry into the legality of the conflict.
The prime minister was given a 14-day deadline to agree before the families apply for judicial review.
They told a press conference they had very real concerns about the legality of the war, and that the situation had changed as a result of last week's publication of the attorney general's previously secret advice to Mr Blair on the issue.
Lawyers for the troops' relatives say they believe they have at least a 50-50 chance of forcing an inquiry.
Phil Shiner, the solicitor who has prepared the legal case, said it was "a very straightforward matter" of asking the government to hold an independent inquiry.
Asserting the right of the families to secure closure, Mr Shiner said that families had lost their loved ones and were entitled to know that the conflict had been lawful.
He said things had changed fundamentally following the disclosure of the attorney's advice, adding that it was now known that Mr Blair had committed himself to regime change in Iraq. He said Mr Blair could be the subject of a private prosecution over the war and possible allegations about his conduct in public office.
Mr Blair was again confronted by a member of the public angry about the war as he continued his tour of marginal constituencies and again found his attempted focus on the economy overshadowed by Iraq.