Phillip Hammond’s speech to the Tory conference this week contained an interesting omission. He spoke of “35 years in which we have seen real living standards almost double in this country.” What he omitted to say was that all that growth came before 2007. GDP per head now is barely higher than it was then, and real wages are lower.

This reveals something – an inability of the Tory party to confront the modern world. Hammond just couldn’t admit to the realities of capitalist stagnation.

In this, of course, Hammond is not alone. We should see his speech alongside Amber Rudd’s willful inability to understand the internet, Johnson’s recitation of Kipling, and Rees-Mogg’s irrelevant invocation of Crecy and Agincourt. All are examples of the Tories being much more comfortable in the past than the present. Brexit, of course, is another example of this. For every Tory who sincerely regards this as a means of transforming the UK into an open global trading nation, it is for many more an effort to return us to a pre-immigration era.

All this nostalgia contrasts with the fact that the truly successful parties of post-war Britain have been forward-looking. Think of Attlee’s talk of building a “new Jerusalem”; Macmillan’s embrace of decolonization and a mixed economy; Wilson’s “white hot heat of technology”; Thatcher’s efforts to improve industrial relations so the UK could compete in a global economy; and of course Tony Blair couldn’t open his mouth in the 90s without talking of modernization.

In this sense, not only are the Tories not a party of government, they are barely even an opposition in waiting. They are just a small group of pensioners out of touch with the country.

How did they get themselves into this mess? I don’t think it’s simply because so many are so thunderingly mediocre: Theresa May’s “burning injustice” speech on becoming PM demonstrated some awareness of the challenges we face.

Instead, their problem is a structural one. Any serious attempt at modernizing the economy would alienate the party’s client base. As Richard Seymour says:

They no longer have any idea how to administer capitalism. No viable long-term growth strategy avails. They can't address the financial sector without hurting their allies in the City. They can't address the crisis of productivity and investment without more state intervention than they're willing to accept. They can't address the housing crisis or the precarious debt-driven economy without harming the interests of home owners.

In this context, speculation about the Tory leadership is irrelevant; it’s just another example of imbecile leadershipitis that disfigures British thinking not just about politics but business and sport too. The party’s crisis is much deeper than that.