David Cameron’s image-makers never leave a backdrop to chance. In his three years in the role the scenery behind the Conservative leader has shifted with his evolving project.

Delivering his sombre message on the need for a “government of thrift” in an “age of austerity”, Mr Cameron shared a stage last weekend with his Shadow Cabinet. In presentational terms its primary purpose was almost certainly to reassure voters who fear that the re-branded Conservatives are a one-man band.

Unusually, the image-makers seem to have failed to spot an obvious flaw. The staging highlighted starkly how dominated by men his top team is. It allowed newspaper pictures of Mr Cameron in a sea of grey suits. This mistake — a basic error — would not matter so much if it did not reflect a growing concern that, as the party switches its message to the minor key in tune with the recession, it is losing modernising momentum. Andy Coulson, Mr Cameron’s director of communications, has told colleagues that he believes that winning the battle over the economy and pinning the blame for the recession on Gordon Brown is the Tories’ priority. To this end Philip Hammond, the Shadow Chief Secretary with a bank manager’s manner, has been given an enhanced role; he joins George Osborne and Kenneth Clarke explaining how the Tories would help Britain to cope in the age of austerity. Mr Osborne told activists that Mr Hammond would be one of the most important members of a Conservative government.

The all-male line-up on the Conservatives’ economic A-team is, however, drawing attention to Mr Cameron’s failure to make his Shadow Cabinet more reflective of the electorate. Its creation follows a reshuffle in January in which Mr Cameron ducked the chance to increase the number of women in his top team, instead demoting Caroline Spelman from her job as party chairman. Ms Spelman was regarded as tainted after a lengthy parliamentary standards’ inquiry.

Theresa May, moved sideways to the Work and Pensions brief, is not rated highly as a media performer and Baroness Warsi has struggled to maintain a reputation as a safe pair of hands when dealing with the press. Baroness Neville-Jones has also not emerged as a trusted performer. Joyce Anelay, Opposition Chief Whip in the Lords, is listed on the Shadow Cabinet section of the Conservatives’ website with an explanatory phrase in brackets “Attending Shadow Cabinet”.

Ms Spelman’s replacement by Eric Pickles means that the party’s “electoral board”, which is planning the next campaign, is dominated by men. It is a picture repeated within the Tory leader’s inner circle: aside from Mr Cameron himself the three most powerful figures are Mr Osborne, Mr Coulson and Steve Hilton, the Tory leader’s director of strategy.

Tory campaigners say that they trust their leader to honour his commitment to promote women. The most senior member of his inner office is Catherine Fall, his deputy chief of staff. In 2001 Ms Fall wrote an essay called Tories are from Mars, Voters are From Venus, calling for more radical action to promote women in the party. In it she tells how she was rejected for a seat after attending a selection meeting when pregnant.

She would, no doubt, approve of Andrea Leadsom, the Tory candidate for Northamptonshire South. She won her selection meeting for the seat on the day that her daughter was born. “Some people seem horrified, but Charlotte was born at 2.30 in the morning, and at 6am my two boys charged in to see their new sister,” she said. “I then had a sleep, after which it seemed a bit pathetic to miss the primary. I’m going in to politics for my children, and am more driven than ever to tackle what our children are going to inherit.”

Promising to increase women’s representation after his leadership victory, Mr Cameron pointed out that nine out of ten Conservative MPs are, “like me”, white men. Within weeks of winning he had announced the A list, an initiative to encourage local associations to chose from a more diverse pool. Constituency associations were made to watch a DVD of Mr Cameron telling them that gender balance mattered during a selection. This has seen some success, but perhaps not as much as he might have hoped. According to an analysis of the top 100 target seats by The Times, 26 have selected women candidates. In seats where the Tory candidate is standing down, about half are women.

Research by the Fabian Society showed that this is in line with, but no better than, Labour and Liberal Democrat selections, falling short of Mr Cameron’s aspiration that a third of candidates should be women.

Some of the party’s most highly qualified women supporters are finding it hard to get seats. ConservativeHome, the activists’ website, found that 14 out of the 26 A-list candidates who are still searching for seats are women. Anne Jenkin, a member of the Women2Win campaign group, said she feared that the party was in danger of losing existing female candidates as the likely date of the election slips into the middle of next year. “I think there are a number just clinging on by their finger nails,” she said.

Times Recommends

• How I lost the gift of joy for a while
• Why Ann Widdecombe has got it wrong
• Alas, it’s the end of the road for petrolheads