Davis campaign branded 'arrogant'

The shadow Home Secretary's team regrouped yesterday to absorb the impact of the past few days in which Mr Davis's position as frontrunner has been seriously threatened.

Rival camps were predicting that he might not even make it through to the final ballot, despite the apparently unassailable lead he had built up before this week's Conservative conference in Blackpool.

There were signs of a backlash against Mr Davis's operation, with rumours circulating that some of his declared supporters were complaining they had been signed up almost under duress. New MPs, and others hungry for promotion, were reputedly told by Mr Davis's managers that he was certain to win and that anyone who wanted a successful future would improve their chances by joining the winning side.

"There is no point in denying David has had a bad time over the past two days," one of his team said. "There has been a sort of herd instinct going against him. We have got to recognise that it's a big issue.

"A lot of people in the media see us as arrogant, cocky and rude. We will have to address that."

His campaign manager, Derek Conway, admitted Mr Davis had allowed himself to be outshone by David Cameron in their speeches to the conference. He forecast the final run-off would be between Mr Davis and Mr Cameron.

"It was not a brilliant speech and David Davis would be the first to admit that. Big platform speeches are not really his thing," Mr Conway said.

The Davis camp had compiled a list of 66 MPs openly supporting their candidate before the conference began. They say they have more names that will be released in the next few days but they are bracing themselves for the possibility that some of his declared backers will defect. By yesterday, the only person on the original list of 66 to ask to have his name removed was Michael Fabricant, who said that as a party whip he needed to be neutral, but at least four MPs who were on the Davis list of "probable" supporters have gone over in the past two days either to David Cameron or Mr Davis's rival on the right of the Tory party, Liam Fox.

So far, 129 out of 198 Tory MPs have declared themselves, though each campaign team claims to have received private promises. The number of known backers for each candidate are David Davis - 65, David Cameron - 26, Kenneth Clarke - 17, Liam Fox - 14, Sir Malcolm Rifkind - seven.