The Conservative Party developed many vices towards the end of its 14 years in power, but one of the most damaging must be its modern fixation on “unity”.

Perhaps that sounds odd – after all, isn’t the old saying is that divided parties won’t win? But there is no contradiction: the Tories’ problem is that by the end, the were so divided that the only way to maintain at least an outward appearance of unity was to lapse into something close to paralysis.

No man ought to know this better than Rishi Sunak. There is no doubt that he received an absolute hospital pass when he took over from Liz Truss in 2022 with the unenviable mission of trying to un-sink a ship she had managed almost to scuttle in just 50 days.

Yet even allowing for that, his premiership was one of extraordinary inertia.

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