Listening to Conservative leadership candidates these past few weeks it has sometimes seemed as if another party altogether challenged Tony Blair last May. Subsidies for private health care, demonisation of asylum seekers and travellers, opposition to university tuition fees – all have been disowned by most of the would-be leaders.

This is to the good. The first stage in any Tory recovery is a realisation of how badly they fared against an unpopular government and why political opportunism will not persuade voters that the party is a credible alternative government.