Presidents of US, EU and France have all stuck deals in 2023 with Rishi Sunak and has agreements on the Northern Ireland protocol, the Aukus security pact, and bilateral co-operation on migration and defence with France.

The Tory party, is the world’s most successful centre-right political party governing for two thirds of the past 100 years, who has an infinite capacity for reinvention after the fever dream of Brexit and Trumpian insurgency. Reinventing its ideology and changing its leaders have been pivotal to its election successes.

Historian, Tim Bale, offers an analytical narrative of the Tory Party since Britain voted to leave the EU in 2016. He illuminates  a contemporary conservatism  that pulsated with self-interest and ideology, in which politics is only tactical.  He highlights the ‘Party in the media”, with newspapers and magazine editors, commentators, bloggers and think-tankers who are now as much part of the party milieu as its MPs. Despite four prime ministers in seven years, Tory party’s electoral success, the party’s record in government since Brexit has little to redeem it.  Bale’s take us on rollercoaster ride through the Conservatives’ fortunes over the last decade from the bombshell 2016 Brexit referendum through to the chaotic premierships of Theresa May, Boris Johnstone, and Liz Truss, and all the way up to Rishi to the beginning of Rishi Sunak’s premiership in 2022.  Bale’s story involves repeated political misjudgment , serial dishonesty followed by spectacular failures. Bale asks has the Conservative party “slipped its moorings” as a mainstream centre-right party and become ersatz version of populist radical rightwing outfit”.

Tory party has always not tolerated the emergence of a serious challenger from right, helped by the first past the post electoral system. Bale tells the fascinating tale of party that, in just a few short years, has gone from nervous breakdown to top of the world – and back again.

Tory party is the most adaptable and convincing, saying whatever it takes to win.

The Conservative Party After Brexit: Turmoil and Transformation By Tim Bale, Polity £25, 384 pages.