Prime Minister Gordon Brown has confirmed that he considered holding a snap election but said he wanted "more time to set out my vision for the future of the country".
Mr Brown said his "first instinct" was always that he needed more time to show voters how he was governing the country before going to the polls.
But he refused to blame advisers for the election frenzy which built up ahead of his announcement this weekend that there would be no poll.
He said: "I take full responsibility for everything that has happened."
Following his announcement on Saturday that he would not go to the country this year, Conservatives accused Mr Brown of being a "bottler".
Tory leader David Cameron said he was treating the voters like fools by trying to claim that his decision was not driven by Labour's sudden slump in the polls.
In his regular monthly press conference at 10 Downing Street this morning, Mr Brown said: "Yes, I did consider holding an election. Yes, I looked at it.
"My first instinct, if I were honest with all of you, was that I wanted to get on with my job of putting my vision of what the future of the country was to the people of the country and deliver on it before there was ever an election.
"But I did listen to people. I looked at what people were saying. I heard from candidates in marginal seats - those candidates in marginal seats were telling us we would win the election.
"I happen to believe we would win at any time. I made my decision on this basis: I wanted more time to set out my vision for the future of the country."
