"Got a sinking feeling, Dave?" asks the Sun, which carries a picture of the Tory leader knee-deep in floodwater. The paper's Trevor Kavanagh continues the theme: there has been a "flood of foul-ups" and the party is "dead in the water". The Tories are soft, arrogant and idle and should, like Gordon Brown, be visiting flood victims in the Tory heartlands rather than jetting off to Rwanda, Kavanagh writes.
"Buck up, Cam", says the paper's leader, listing three promises Mr Cameron must make if he wants to gain the paper's backing: to build more prisons, hold a referendum on the EU treaty and tighten border controls.
The Telegraph joins in the attack, prompted by news of backbencher discontent and rumoured letters to the chairman of the 1922 committee after poor byelection results and a slide in the opinion polls. The paper features a cartoon of a drowning David Cameron waving at Mr Brown's back as the PM walks effortlessly across water, and offers words of advice from its commentators.
The Conservatives have been "sloppy and complacent", writes Alice Thomson, and have made a series of tactical errors, including becoming embroiled in the grammar school row. However, Mr Cameron has successfully repositioned the party as "in tune with both metropolitan Britain and the middle classes", and has 10 weeks before the Conservative party conference to get his message across. He needs to be more passionate, work harder, dampen expectations and "tell the whingers that this is their last chance". The paper's Janet Daley has one piece of advice for Mr Cameron: stop the "modernisation mania".
"But overall," says the Mail, "hasn't Mr Cameron worked wonders for the party in his first 18 months - making them seem electable again ... and hasn't he also said or done much for traditionalists to admire - including standing up for marriage and the family in a way that Labour still won't?"
The Guardian also has some words of advice, after conceding that the timing of Mr Cameron's trip to Rwanda is "unlucky". The Tory leader needs to hold his nerve against Mr Brown and internal doubters, and to take control of policy-making, it says. By the end of the year, the party needs "a clear, short, and coherent set of proposals that represent the party's aims of government".
The paper probably does not have in mind the Tories' Breakdown Britain document, which the Times scoffs at today for being in the style of a Haynes motoring manual. Aimed at highlighting Conservative plans on social policy, it illustrates social problems as if they were broken car components. The first chapter, entitled Family Unit Breakdown, declares: "If not treated immediately, other related problems may occur." The "family unit" is represented as an interlocking gearbox, with arrows pointing to components such as "commitment", "strong values", "mother" and "father". The car engine represents the education system.
* This is an extended extract from the Wrap, Guardian Unlimited's digest of the daily papers.
