Party chief concedes Conservatives ‘may not win next election’

Mr Shapps said the Conservatives would have to show “leadership and vision” if they were to stand a chance of gaining an outright majority in 2015.

However, in a clear warning to would-be leadership challengers, he stressed that David Cameron remained more popular in the country than the party as a whole.

And in a series of attacks on their Liberal Democrat coalition partners, he dismissed Business Secretary Vince Cable as a “commentator on the economy”.

In an interview with Parliament’s The House magazine, Mr Shapps, who is in charge of the party organisation, acknowledged there was no guarantee they would recover in time for the next general election.

He also sought to play down reports that Home Secretary Theresa May was preparing the ground for a future leadership challenge, after she delivered a speech setting out her political vision ranging way beyond her departmental brief. “It was a very good speech. Sometimes parties get in power and they stop fizzing with ideas. I think it’s really good for the party,” he said.

But amid growing unrest among Tory MPs, he warned against any attempt to unseat Mr Cameron.

“David Cameron is more popular than all of us ... more popular than all of the party in the country, which is a key point that lots of people do recognise,” he said.

In a move apparently designed to boost party morale, he suggested the next election manifesto could include a commitment to restrict child benefit and other welfare payments to two children per family.

He also picked up on Lib Dem president Tim Farron’s suggestion that they had the resilience of cockroaches.

“I don’t want to go any further than the president of the Liberal Democrats when I describe our Liberal Democrat partners in Government, and I will not be forced into a position of calling them anything worse than cockroaches,” he said.

But he was particularly scathing about Mr Cable who has been pressing for a big increase in infrastructure spending in next week’s Budget to kick-start economic growth.

“I was listening to the radio. Vince Cable was on and, you know, he was sort of a commentator on the economy and what have you,” he said. “We’ve come together in the national interest, and we should be leaders in that, not commentating on every aspect and twist and turn.”