Mitt Romney’s efforts to become the preferred candidate for social conservatives were rewarded at the weekend when he won a straw poll asking attendees at the Conservative Political Ac­tion Conference who they thought was most likely to be the Republican presidential nominee in 2008.

Mr Romney, a former governor of Massachusetts, had faced scepticism at the conference amid charges that he had flip-flopped on some of the critical issues for conservatives, changing his stance on gay and abortion rights. The initial reception to his speech at the conference on Friday was far less enthusiastic than the rousing greeting for the celebrity figure of Rudy Giuliani, former mayor of New York.