Gordon Brown was forced to defend Douglas Alexander yesterday, after his embattled election co-ordinator came under increasing pressure to resign over his role in the Holyrood election fiasco.

In a heated exchange at Prime Minister’s Questions, Mr Brown said that all parties should share the blame for the mistakes made in the Scottish election, which led to 140,000 ballot papers being rejected.

David Cameron, the Conservative leader, said that the Gould report into the poll had blamed ministers for putting Labour Party interests before voters. Mr Brown, in turn, accused Mr Cameron of misleading people about the report’s conclusions, a remark that resulted in a caution from Michael Martin, the Speaker, who told him to use “temperate language”.

Earlier Mr Alexander issued an apology “for any actions or omissions” that contributed to the problems that beset the elections. But if he was hoping that his statement would defuse the row, he was to be disappointed. Instead, his opponents accused him of offering a half-hearted apology.

At Holyrood, Alex Salmond kept up the pressure on the Government over the central recommendation of the report that control over Scottish elections should be transferred from Westminster to Holyrood. This conclusion, which the First Minister described as a “basic and fundamental principle”, is being resisted by the Government.

“It is logical. It is fair. It is in the best interests of the Scottish people,” the First Minister said in an emergency statement to the Scottish Parliament.

An inquiry into the May election concluded this week that ministerial decisions on the design of the ballot papers and on the timing and method of the counts had treated voters as an afterthought. However, while the Gould report appears to point the finger at Mr Alexander, it does not expressly name him and also confused the issue by saying that all political parties were guilty because they had put their own interests ahead of those of the electorate.

The latter point has been conceded privately by opposition politicians, who accept that all the main parties supported the move from two separate ballot papers to one.

Mr Brown also seized on this to tell MPs that all parties must share the responsibility. Mr Cameron accused him of “gall” and called on him to strip Mr Alexander of his responsibility for elections. “It [the report] found that the Labour Government put party interest before voters’ interest in conducting those elections. Will you now offer your own personal apology for the unacceptable conduct of ministers?”

Mr Brown replied that the Gould report did not pin the blame on any individual or institution and that all parties in Scotland, including the Tories, had supported the changes.

Mr Cameron then demanded to know how Mr Alexander, as International Development Secretary, could “go round the world lecturing other countries about probity in their elections”. Mr Brown hit back: “Because you are misleading people about the conclusions of this report.”

As furious Tories demanded that the Prime Minister withdraw the allegation, Mr Martin told the House after consulting with his clerks: “I call for temperate language.”

Mr Alexander also called on all parties to accept their share of the blame. He said that the Scotland Office consulted widely upon the proposal for a single ballot paper. He said: “That consultation produced an overwhelming consensus among Scotland’s political parties for a single ballot paper. I therefore reject any interpretation of the Gould report that seeks to imply any other motivation.”

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