Chuckling in chapel and a welcome in the hillsides as the war leader takes his message to the Welsh

Two rival groups of children entered into a placard battle outside the church in the small Welsh mining village of Penygraig in the Rhondda Valley, yesterday. They represented the two distant extremities at either end of the enormous middle ground our Prime Minister now occupies.

One group had a megaphone and used it to chant "Put your hands in the air if you hate Tony Blair!". The other group, made up of Official Labour Toddlers, was struggling with a large cardboard sheet bearing the words "We Love You Tony!". They seemed too young to love anyone outside their immediate family, and frankly, I doubt whether they'd even met him before.

The two groups eventually got together after Mr Blair had entered the chapel and proceeded to whale the tar out of each other in the most passionate engagement of this month-long campaign to elect the next Welsh Assembly.

Those who take an interest in such things will know that nothing will happen in this election; even if Labour wins back its three traditional seats and thus acquire an operating majority, there's nothing it would do differently than if it were in coalition with the Liberal Democrats. Free Swimming for Older People! Develop a Scheme for Half-Price Bus Travel for 16-to-18-Year-Olds! So declares the manifesto.

Tony Blair has emerged from his war leadership to address the next great question of his leadership. Has he been so weakened by the war that he'll suck up to the left with astounding bribes from the public purse? Or will he be so energised by the electorate liking his role as man o'convictions that he'll press on with his daring reform programme?

He'll do both. That's what happens when you occupy an enormous middle ground. And that was why he used the Old Labour piety "from the cradle to the grave", and why he hinted at his market-based modernisation programme: "The means we use to reach these [long-term Labour goals] have changed, in some cases beyond all recognition."

It wasn't the time or the place to remind his audience that Wales has had a 40 per cent increase in health funding and still has the worst waiting lists in Europe.

One thing was clear: no-one can take a hall with him like our Prime Minister. The Duke of Wellington used to say of Napoleon that his presence on the battlefield was worth 40,000 men. So it is with Mr Blair. His presence in the argument changes the terms of debate. Those who come to jeer, heckle or scowl in the back seats get rolled. It happened at the last Labour conference; it happened on the floor of the House during the Iraq debate; and it happened in the Rhondda.

That is quite a feat for a nice young English public schoolboy in a Welsh mining village. How does he do it? He doesn't have Clinton's conversational embrace. On the ground, among the tea tables, he's still a bit Are You Being Served? compared with the awesome professionalism of The Simpsons. But up there on his podium he can stick it to an audience like no-one else on the front bench.

It starts with humility. He knows he is a controversial stranger. He ventures a few remarks in low tones. As a conman he'd be taking you into his confidence before fleecing you; as a prime minister he is paying you the immense compliment of addressing you as an equal. It probably comes to the same thing.

His first words are punctuated by his shy smile, the one he starts doing when he feels he's made sufficient contact. Then the dry jokes work as well as any of William Hague's comedic presentations. "Very nice to see so many journalists in chapel." (Laughter) "Something only the Labour Party could achieve." (More laughter, especially from journalists) He referred obliquely to his family credentials. "I see parents here and grandparents. The great thing about grandchildren is that you can give them back." That's quite a daring joke for a politician. When a baby cried in the middle of his litany of political successes (unemployment percentages, inflation figures, mortgage comparisons), a large grandmother walked across between him and his audience in an unignorable way. "You see, Rhodri," he said, "that's real work." Yes, the prime ministerial presence works its magic. Tony Blair slaughtered them. And they loved it.

"He's a class act," I said to a couple of elderly gentlemen as we left. "Oh yes," they chuckled, "a class act indeed." There was a pause, and one said: "Stratford quality!" If the Rhondda Valley is anything to go by, Mr Blair can take heart and ignore his traditional enemies in Parliament, particularly on his back bench. The real action is elsewhere.