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Former minister Frank Field has threatened to restart the rebellion over the abolition of the 10p tax rate if the government does not clearly set out its compensation package.
In an article for the Mail on Sunday, Field warned that Labour rebels were prepared to block the Budget unless ministers made it "crystal clear" how those affected by the income tax change would be recompensed.
Blaming much of Labour's poor performance in the local elections on the 10p row, he said this month's Crewe and Nantwich by-election and the future of the Brown government were at stake over the issue.
Last month Field withdrew an amendment to the Finance Bill challenging the abolition of the 10p rate, after receiving assurances that low-paid workers and pensioners aged 60-64 would receive help.
But he said chancellor Alistair Darling's explanations of how the tax change would be offset through the winter fuel allowance, tax credits and the minimum wage had been "clear as mud".
"I believe that the prime minister will be as good as his word, that the package will cover as many of the 10p losers as possible and that it will be fully backdated," he wrote.
"But that is not the message that voters hear. The government must learn the lessons of its ineptitude in handling the 10p tax tax controversy. And it needs to do so in double-quick time."
Field said he would table a parliamentary motion when the Commons returned after the bank holiday on Tuesday, calling for an explanation of the compensation measures.
Dods Parliamentary Communications Ltd