WHEN WENDY Alexander faced Alex Salmond at First Minister's Questions in Holyrood and repeated her support for an early referendum on Scottish independence, the anger level inside Number 10 is said to have been off the scale. One aide close to Gordon Brown described Alexander as "reckless". Another called her "a selfish and stupid individual" who "hasn't got a clue when it comes to understanding the consequences of what happens when she opens her mouth".

He added: "Our options? We can only hope she falls on her sword, but we can't have the authority of the prime minister being undermined by a political pygmy. This was complete and utter freelancing by Wendy Alexander and Gordon never agreed to any of this."

Brown and Alexander had regularly discussed devolution, and how it was evolving, over the last few months. A recent discussion had taken place just over a week ago. But had there, as Alexander claimed, been a decision to challenge the SNP to advance their manifesto promise for a referendum bill by 2010? One aide who talked to the Sunday Herald was clear - there was no agreement. This appears to be confirmed in a newspaper interview today, where Brown states he is still "not convinced" a referendum is the way forward.

Aides close to Brown who, until the beginning of last week were focused on administering the political first aid the government needs to survive the coming Crewe and Nantwich by-election - after the massacre at the local elections in England and Wales and the loss of London to Boris Johnson - hit the panic buttons when they learned Alexander had unilaterally announced she was in favour of the Scottish Nationalists bringing forward their timetable on a referendum bill in Holyrood.

One Brown aide described a series of calls to Scotland to find out "what the hell was going on" and subsequently to an agreement to find "a way of finessing what she had told BBC Scotland" so that the prime minister could avoid what another adviser called "dumping her in it".

The finesse, when it arrived after the opening question of Prime Minister's Questions last Wednesday, sounded weak and not particularly believable. Alexander's "bring it on" call to the SNP administration in Holyrood was, Brown told the Commons, not what she said. The agreed "finesse" was that Alexander had been misunderstood in two interviews, in one of which she claimed she had the backing of Brown for the sudden policy reversal in backing a constitutional referendum that, if lost, could lead to the break-up of the United Kingdom.

One senior adviser said the PM during PMQs was "not being evasive, but trying to help her Alexander".

Days later, when Alex Salmond was running rings rounds Alexander in Holyrood and evidently enjoying the self-inflicted turmoil in Labour ranks both north and south of the Border, Labour's MPs in Westminster are said to have begun wondering if a private decision they had taken on Tuesday night to "fall in behind her call for a referendum" was necessarily the right one, given the turmoil they were now witnessing.

Their initial meeting centred on the need to involve Brown's government, get Number 10's help and begin constructing the pro-union alliance that they believed should have been in place before Alexander made her unilateral declaration.

One Scottish Labour MP said: "If this change of policy was so important, so crucial, and said by Wendy Alexander to have been agreed on by herself and Gordon, then I don't understand why she was in a television studio, giving a one-on-one interview. Where was the preparation? Where was the discussion that should have gone on beforehand with her colleagues and advisers? At the very least you'd have expected a high-profile press conference with a planned release of information and reasons as to why this was happening now. But there was none of this. And since no-one was pushing her to do this, why was she doing it? "

Another MP suggested the episode illustrated the state of the Labour Party in Scotland: "This exposes Alexander's relative inexperience. She has limited knowledge of how Westminster works, and when she resigned from the Scottish Executive she was still learning what it meant to be a junior minister in Holyrood. But what has happened is just so badly done. If she'd have been logical and involved all her colleagues, and sought the appropriate timing from Downing Street, maybe the support would have been better. Instead, many of us are wandering around and saying this is another fine mess you've got us in to'."

For another MP, the way out now is for Labour to begin constructing the pro-union alliance that should have been in place before Alexander talked to BBC Scotland. Scottish MPs know that, however important the referendum story is in Scottish media headlines, there are other crucial policy issues facing them at Westminster.

"We still need to address the importance of civil rights and the question over the extension of detention without charge to 42 days; there's still the outstanding issue of the 10p tax rate and a settlement on the coming embryology bill," said one.

THE issues Brown still has to tackle in Westminster, the enduring question marks over his leadership, Labour's meltdown in the UK polls, the attempt to organise a creditable fightback and, crucially, a believable statement on what Brown's Labour project now stands for - all were in the PM's in-tray at the beginning of last week, and are still there. Another government adviser, who admitted Labour would face at least two terms in opposition if they lose the next general election, felt that Alexander couldn't have calculated the UK-wide effect of what she was proposing.

"What did she expect the prime minister would do if suddenly the SNP had agreed to a fast-tracked referendum? He'd be forced to leave London, surround himself with the swirl of bagpipes and spend four weeks campaigning in Scotland to save the break-up of the United Kingdom. How would that have gone down in the rest of the country at this particular time?

"The sad reality is that Labour's first two leaders in Scotland had experience of politics in both Scotland and Westminster. Both Donald Dewar and Henry McLeish knew and understood both worlds. Jack McConnell and Wendy are Labour leaders in Scotland who define themselves only within the terrain of Scottish politics. So - and this is being kind - on the first anniversary of Alex Salmond becoming first minister, and with Gordon in trouble in Westminster after the worst local election results for 40 years, what does Wendy choose to do? She thought it better to attack Salmond, define herself in Scottish-only terms and as a result has left herself weakened and left the wider Labour Party and the prime minister damaged, too. She is totally naive and has left us with a toxic set of issues."

When Downing Street telephoned some of Alexander's own aides in Edinburgh, part of the initial explanation offered was that they didn't think the referendum story "would run south of the Border".

Given the inevitability of an independence referendum, which if the SNP's tactics prevail will most likely be fought with a Conservative government in Westminster, some senior Labour figures say they are now worried where the core unionist vote will go. One Labour analyst said: "Where do unionists go? Which party do they trust with their unionist faith? And remember, there are parts of the Labour Party in Scotland who didn't even like devolution. Well, the most pro-union party at the moment looks like the Conservatives."

For other MPs in Westminster, who accept that Alexander's timing couldn't have been worse, pragmatism is the best response left. A referendum will now happen eventually, and some believe the campaigning and the arguments should begin now.

One said: "We have a minority Scottish government flying by the seat of its pants, abusing its executive power and holding conversations with itself. Some of us wanted to see the independence question on the referendum ballot paper back in 1997. There should have been a third question asking Do you wish Scotland to remain part of the United Kingdom?' It never happened. Now we need to argue and set out what stable framework needs to be in place for the union to move ahead.

"The unionist parties, the Tories and the Liberal Democrats, have to begin talking seriously to each other. And when the Calman Commission set up to examine the powers of the Scottish parliament delivers its report, our response has to be co-ordinated."

For ministers and senior party figures, offering up prayers that Alexander will walk before being pushed, there is only one question: if Wendy goes and has to be replaced ... how could anyone do a worse job?