Hardly a day seems to go by without another candidate entering the “race” to be leader of the Conservative Party. We say race but this is beginning to look more like the Charge of the Light Brigade. One can only hope that it will have a better outcome, but that will depend on whether the contenders charge in the right direction and at the right target.

As this list has grown and grown, what has gone missing is the important point that this leadership election is about picking the next Prime Minister. Those who have thrown their hats into the ring, with minimum support but imbued with an enormous sense of self-worth, need to think a little more carefully. After all, whoever gets selected won’t have the space that a leader of the opposition has to develop into the job, to become known to the public, or to learn the ropes of government.

Instead, the new Prime Minister will not only face the onerous task of resolving Brexit but also of running a Cabinet that has looked depressingly and dangerously dysfunctional in recent weeks. They will need to give new energy and direction to a government that seems to have lost its way across a range of crucial areas. It is genuinely questionable whether some of those who have declared have done so with any real understanding of any of this or they recognise the difference between leadership in opposition and becoming Prime Minister.

The 1922 Committee, it is hoped, will step in to sort out what commentators are beginning to call a farce. Yet whoever becomes Prime Minister will have to face the fact that it is impossible to overstate the precarious position the Tory party is in. It is teetering on the brink and we should remember the fate of the Progressive Conservatives in Canada in 1993 – we do not have a right to govern or even exist as a party. The next PM will need real authority and a clear road map.