Business is forging increased links with the Conservative Party amid a growing expectation that it will form the next government.

Well-placed business sources say that a growing number of large companies, particularly in the manufacturing and banking sectors, have approached the Tories for top-level meetings in the hope of shaping policy.

The Tories recently announced that the party would work with the aero-space company Rolls-Royce to map out a strategy for high-value-added manufacturing.

Alan Duncan, the Shadow Business Secretary, has recently met the chief executives or chairmen of BP, Shell, Vodafone, EdF and Total. He said: “They are knocking on the door.” The Tories have also tried to win business confidence by promising to cut corporation tax from 28p to 25p, although companies have raised concerns over plans to cut research and development tax allowances.

Martin Temple, chairman of the EEF manufacturers’ organisation, said: “There has been an increasingly positive dialogue with business and industry and an increasing desire to understand manufacturers’ concerns. We will need to see this translated into policy commitments which have competitiveness at their heart.”

A variety of FTSE 100 companies have started “double briefing” in the past few weeks, setting up shadow public affairs departments to improve relations with the Tory front bench.

One of Britain’s biggest energy companies acknowledged that it had stepped up its lobbying of senior Conservative figures recently, although it emphasised that it had always maintained close contact with the party.

The same source said that there was a campaign on the part of public affairs consultancies to cement links to the Conservative Party. One source at a lobbying group said that clients were interested only in speaking to the Conservatives.

The Tories already have close links with the public affairs industry. Not only is David Cameron a former PR executive but Charles Hendry, the Shadow Energy Minister, was an executive at the PR firms Burson-Marsteller and Ogilvy and Mather. The party has built links with business groups over the past 18 months through Conservative Business Relations, an organisation that organises contacts between businesses and MPs.

About 1,200 City workers crammed into the City Grange Hotel two weeks ago to hear George Osborne, the Shadow Chancellor, speak. Two years ago, a fraction of that number were turning up for political get-togethers. Meetings are planned with Boris Johnson, the new Mayor of London, and David Cameron.

City Circle, which fosters ties between the financial services industry and the party and which is co-chaired by Michael Spencer, a City tycoon and the chief executive of ICAP, has 7,000 supporters. City Future, a sister organisation for City people under 35, has 1,000 on its database. One senior banker said there had been a significant change in attitudes. “A year ago the Tories were pushing hard to see bank chief executives. Now it’s the chief executives who are agitating to see Cameron and Osborne.”

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