Profile: The man who brought down Davis

When Eric Forth lashed out at "dark forces" behind a whispering campaign against David Davis, everyone at Westminster knew who he meant. Outside the political village in SW1, however, not even many Tories could name the unconventional, scruffy but brilliant young apparatchik who has emerged as the Davis camp's most hated enemy.

Dominic Cummings, 30, does not look like a Tory Boy. In place of the traditional pin-striped Central Office uniform he wears modish casual jackets almost always without a tie.

He was not even a member when Iain Duncan Smith astonished his shadow cabinet by creating the post of Director of Strategy for a relatively obscure Save the Pound campaigner with no track record in mainstream party politics.

The appointment of Mr Cummings can only be explained as an act by the Tory leader to shake up not only his party's narrow outlook, but his own. Mr Cummings is clever. At Oxford - where he showed no political leanings - he achieved a first in history.

With his understanding of marketing and disdain for party traditions, he may be the nearest figure the Tories have had to a Peter Mandelson.

At Business for Sterling, the anti-euro pressure group he helped build, he scored several successes, transforming it from a Little Englander sect to a broad campaign which attracted Labour Party supporters and celebrities. By contrast, Tony Blair's well funded rival, Britain in Europe, came near to collapse.

Mr Cummings made no secret of his low regard for the Tories under William Hague. He believed Mr Hague's decision to centre the 2001 election campaign around the Pound was a colossal blunder. He was proved right when, a week before Polling Day, Mr Hague was forced to abandon his single currency campaign and attempt, too late, to resucitate public services as a Tory issue.

During the campaign, the No Campaign closed its office. Mr Cummings saw that as essential to protect it from being infected with Mr Hague's skinhead version of Toryism.

Mr Cummings collected his membership card in February when he moved to Conservative HQ from the No Campaign. Shadow cabinet modernisers were delighted, but he quickly acquired enemies as well.

The biggest was Mr Davis, irritated his junior rival did not report to him but directly to Mr Duncan Smith. In June, their emnity flared when Mr Cummings made a gaffe, declaring: "The biggest potential threat to the pound's survival is the Conservative party."

Mr Davis publicly slapped him down.