The Conservative conference is due to get under way in Birmingham with the Tories looking to recover from a ministerial resignation and defection.
The party was hit on Saturday by a second Tory MP in a month quitting for UKIP and a minister standing down after claims about his private life.
Party chairman Grant Shapps is to give the first major speech at 14:00 BST.
A number of election pledges were unveiled on the eve of the conference, including fresh benefit cuts.
But they were overshadowed on Saturday when MP for Rochester and Strood Mark Reckless announced at the UKIP conference he was stepping down to join the Conservatives' rivals.
Within hours, Brooks Newmark had resigned from the cabinet after the Sunday Mirror alleged the Conservative minister for civil society had sent an explicit photograph of himself to an undercover reporter posing as a female party activist.
The setbacks came as Chancellor George Osborne said a future Conservative government would look to make further changes to social security.
Speaking to the Mail on Sunday, he announced plans to cut out of work and housing benefit payments to young people.
In proposals aimed at funding new apprenticeships to tackle youth unemployment, Mr Osborne also pledged to reduce the total amount individual households can claim in a year.
And on Friday, David Cameron made a pitch to those struggling to get on the housing ladder, saying a Tory administration would build 100,000 homes exclusively available to under-40s at 20% below market rate.
'Tough start'The prime minister had arrived in Birmingham with his wife for the last conference before May's general election just before Mr Newmark's resignation.
BBC political correspondent Robin Brant said his job now was to "steady nerves" and "focus on the positives".
"But this is a tough start for David Cameron," he added.
Mr Reckless's defection to UKIP comes less than a month after Clacton MP Douglas Carswell made the same move.
Both have said they will stand down from Parliament, triggering by-elections.
As UKIP leader Nigel Farage welcomed his latest recruit, Mr Reckless told rapturous delegates at the party's conference in Doncaster: "People feel ignored, taken for granted, over-taxed, over-regulated, ripped off and lied to."
Meanwhile, Conservative peer Lord Ashcroft called on the prime minister to do more win over undecided voters.
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Mark Reckless announces he is joining UKIP
"Starting today in Birmingham, Cameron must help them resolve their quandary in his party's favour," he wrote in the Sunday Times.
"[Mr] Cameron must show that his purpose is not merely a matter of dry economics but the creation of a country where everyone can share in the prosperity that the Tories are accused of wanting to preserve for the few."
The prime minister is due to deliver his set piece speech on Wednesday as he closes the conference.
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