David Cameron’s claim to have widened the party’s funding base is supported by an analysis of donations received under his leadership.

The Tories have been given £52 million in the past three years, with a growing proportion coming in donations of £50,000 — a voluntary maximum introduced by Mr Cameron.

But a small number of wealthy individuals still account for a significant proportion of the party’s income. There are fears, also, that the recession may force the Tories to turn again to big gifts from the super-rich.

Mr Cameron introduced a suggested cap of £50,000 when the cash-for-honours affair brought the question of party funding under the spotlight in the dying days of Tony Blair’s term as Prime Minister.

Although Steve Hilton, his close adviser, wanted to make the ceiling mandatory, Mr Cameron sided with those who believed that such a move could leave the Tory party dangerously short of cash.

To help to recruit a new breed of Tory donor willing to give the party up to £50,000 a year Mr Cameron turned to Andrew Feldman, a university friend who had helped to fund his leadership campaign. While Mr Feldman, who helps to run his family’s textile company, opened his contact books in the world of retail and manufacturing it was to Michael Spencer, the boss of Icap, the inter-dealer broker, that Mr Cameron turned for help with the City. Mr Spencer, at the time described as the City’s richest man, replaced Jonathan Marland as Conservative Party treasurer in December 2006.

Tory fundraising events unchanged for decades were handed to a new generation of modish figures such as Anya Hindmarch, the fashion designer, in an attempt to rehabilitate — and even restore glamour — to the Tories’ political pan-handling.

Mr Cameron introduced a network of donors’ clubs to help to drive the efforts to widen the party’s funding base. For an annual membership fee of £50,000, for example, donors were invited to join the “Leader’s Group”, a body whose events are regularly attended by Mr Cameron. Access to George Osborne, the Shadow Chancellor, was offered to donors ready to pay £25,000 a year, while membership of the Renaissance Forum — at £10,000 — brought only the promise of events attended by a Shadow Cabinet member.

Mr Osborne had to announce that he was withdrawing from direct fundraising after the Oleg Deripaska affair last October. Previously Mr Cameron had justified the implicit offer of privileged access in return for cash on the ground that it helped to democratise funding. “The point of the Leader’s Club is to broaden the base of funding of the party. It makes it much broader and therefore you get over accusations that anyone has got too much influence,” he told The Times last year.

The results of his efforts are shown in an analysis of donations to the Conservatives registered with the Electoral Commission between 2006 and 2008 — the last year for which figures are available. In 2006 the party received £17.6 million and there were 26 donations of £50,000, generating £1.3 million. In 2008, by contrast, the last year for which full figures are available, the party received £15.8 million in donations, of which £3.1 million came in 62 donations of £50,000.

But although he has succeeded in widening the base, the figures show no decline in the contributions from Lord Ashcroft and his wife, Susan Anstey. Lord Ashcroft’s company, Bearwood, has given £3.8 million in cash and polling during Mr Cameron’s leadership with a further £283,860 in donations from Lady Ashcroft. Indeed, cash from the peer has increased. In 2006 Bearwood donated just over half a million pounds in cash and polling. Last year that figure had climbed to £1.6 million.

Nor has there been a decline in donations from unincorporated associations, such as the Midlands Industrial Council. Current legislation means that members of these associations do not have to be declared, allowing them to give to the party without being identified. Although the total amount given to the Tories through unicorporated associations fell to £1.1 million in 2007 it went back up to its 2006 level last year of £1.7 million.

It remains to be seen whether Mr Cameron can sustain the trend of taking a greater proportion of cash in donations of £50,000 through the recession. It is understood that Mr Spencer undershot last year’s fundraising target by about 5 per cent.

The party was forced to make what one official termed “significant budget cuts” and more than a dozen headquarters jobs are to be lost. For the first time since Mr Cameron became leader, Labour outstripped the Tories in the last quarter of 2008 as its union backers proved more recession-proof.

Stanley Fink, the former chief executive of Man Group, the hedge fund manager, was brought in as a “co-treasurer” in January. His pledge of a £1 million donation — yet to show up in official returns — will make it significantly more difficult for Mr Cameron to sustain his claim to have widened his party’s funding base through 2009.

A Tory spokesman said: “Unlike Labour, who depend on a small number of unions for the vast bulk of their funds, the Conservative Party has a broad base of donors. David Cameron has made enormous progress in widening this base. Lord Ashcroft is responsible for a small proportion of these donations.”

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