GORDON Brown made a "dreadful mistake" when he branded a pensioner a "bigoted woman" but that did not make him a monster, one of his senior Cabinet colleagues said today.

As the Prime Minister tried to focus on tonight’s third and final televised leaders’ debate, Home Secretary Alan Johnson said he had been mortified by his unguarded comments about 66-year-old Gillian Duffy.

He said Mr Brown had insisted on going to Mrs Duffy’s home in Rochdale to apologise in person after his remarks to an aide were picked up by a television microphone and broadcast around the world.

"His sensitivity, his humanity, said ’Look, I have to go and talk to this woman’ because he made a dreadful mistake," Mr Johnson told BBC1’s Breakfast programme.

And he insisted that voters like Mrs Duffy, who expressed concern about immigration, were not bigoted and Labour did not regard the issue as being off-limits in the General Election campaign.

"Bigoted, unreasonably prejudiced and intolerant certainly doesn’t apply to Mrs Duffy," he said. "Mrs Duffy isn’t bigoted, Gordon isn’t a monster and the issue of immigration isn’t off limits."

But shadow chief treasury secretary Philip Hammond said voters would draw their own conclusions from Mr Brown’s remarks.

"What I was most struck by was the difference between what he said to Mrs Duffy when he was chatting to her and what he said about Mrs Duffy when he was in what he thought was the privacy of his own car," he told Sky News.

"People will draw their own conclusions about that."

Labour strategists had been hoping that tonight’s debate focusing on the economy would be an opportunity to regain ground in a campaign which has seen them trailing in third place in the polls for much of the time.

But they found themselves trying to pick up the pieces from the fall-out of his explosive chance encounter with Mrs Duffy, who had just popped out to buy a loaf of bread.

Cast your vote on the next page about what you think this incident could mean for Gordon Brown and Labour.

In an email to Labour Party activists last night, Mr Brown offered them the same "profound'' apology he had made to Mrs Duffy, and promised they would see him in a different "context'' in the debate.

"Many of you know me personally," he wrote. "You know I have strengths as well as weaknesses. We all do. You also know that sometimes we say and do things we regret. I profoundly regret what I said."

Sarah Brown joined a slew of Cabinet ministers rallying round in a bid to limit the damage, insisting her "caring" husband "hated the fact he had hurt someone".

The premier had been canvassing in Rochdale when he met retired council worker Mrs Duffy, who asked him a series of questions including about benefits and the Eastern Europeans who had been "flooding" into Britain.

The discussion ended amicably, and the widow - who said she was a life-long Labour voter - said she had found the PM "nice" and intended to vote for him by post.

But as Mr Brown was swept away in his car, he told an aide the encounter had been "a disaster", unaware that his words were being transmitted by a Sky News radio microphone which he had forgotten to remove.

Asked what Mrs Duffy had said, he replied: "Everything, she was just a sort of bigoted woman who said she used to be Labour."

Mrs Duffy appeared shocked when informed of his remarks, insisting: "He’s supposed to be leading the country and he’s calling an ordinary woman who’s come up and asked questions... a bigot."

Played a tape of his words later on BBC Radio 2 - screened live on the TV news channels - a visibly deflated PM put his head in his hand, and was soon heading for Mrs Duffy’s home to beg forgiveness.

Following their 40-minute private meeting, he told reporters he was "mortified".

"I misunderstood what she said," he added. "She has accepted that there was a misunderstanding and she has accepted my apology. If you like, I am a penitent sinner."

Mrs Duffy has yet to emerge publicly to give her account of the exchange.

What do you think of the exchange? Is it curtains for Godron Brown or does it show that he's a human being? Have your say below.