David Cameron has been dragged into accusations the Conservatives planned to save £8 billion by slashing Child Benefit.
As relations between coalition parties deteriorated in the run up to next week's General Election, the Liberal Democrats said that the proposals reached all the way to the Prime Minister.
The Conservatives had earlier attempted to place the blame on Lib Dem Treasury Secretary, and Highland politician, Danny Alexander.
He triggered a war of words between the coalition partners by leaking an internal 2012 government paper which included proposals to limit Child Benefit and Child Tax Credits.
The row comes amid increasing pressure on the Conservatives to set out where their planned £12 billion welfare cuts after the election will come from.
The Tories have asked voters to trust them on the issue and look at their record in saving money from benefits.
But Mr Alexander said that people should look at the Tories real "record" of previously suggested cuts, that the Lib Dems blocked.
The Lib Dem also accused his government colleagues of "trying to con the British people by keeping their planned cuts secret until after the election".
The Conservatives dismissed the claim as "desperate stuff" from the Liberal Democrats and insisted the proposals were "definitely not our policy".
Later the Tory Chancellor George Osborne went on the offensive, claiming that paper had been "commissioned by the Chief Secretary (Mr Alexander) himself".
The Lib Dems hit back at that suggestion and placed the blame squarely at the feet of the Prime Minister.
The three-year-old Tory proposals, which were not implemented,. including removing higher rate Child Benefit from first child, an average cut of more than £360, means-testing Child Benefit, which could cut £1,750 for a two child middle income family and removing Child Benefit from 16-19-year-olds a cut of more than £1,000 for parents of a single child.
Labour leader Ed Miliband said the Tories plans would take thousands of pounds from millions of families
Mr Miliband described the proposals as "devastating" as he claimed that working families could not affect another five years of David Cameron
The row came amid claims that the Lib Dems will find it difficult to enter into a coalition with the Tories if there is a hung parliament in May.
A Tory spokesman said: "This set of policies was never proposed or supported by the Prime Minister and Chancellor and would never be proposed or supported by the PM and Chancellor."
Mr Alexander said the Tories were either being "highly reckless" in not knowing what their policy would be, or "deceitful" in deliberately withholding it.
People expected the Conservatives to "come clean" with just a week to go until polling day, he added, and denied he was scaremongering.
He added that from his experience in the Treasury: "I don't see how you can make that sort of saving (£12 billion in welfare) ... in a way that is in any way balanced or fair."
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