There are three Boris Johnsons, the uncharacteristically invisible one during this leadership election, the Brexit Boris since 2016 and the inclusive, globalist London Mayor Boris from 2008-2016. It is the third incarnation that moderate Conservatives, not to mention non-Conservatives, hope will surface should party members vote him into No 10.

In the past fortnight there has been much focus on Boris’s eight year term as Mayor of London to ascertain whether this record is evidence of his ability to hold down the job of Prime Minister. Boris was surrounded as Mayor by bright deputy Mayors and advisers from local government such as Sir Edward Lister (ex-Wandsworth LBC leader and chief of staff to Boris from 2011), Kit Malthouse (former deputy leader of Westminster City Council), James Cleverley (London Assembly member) and the late Sir Simon Milton (former Westminster leader and chair of the Local Government Association). Indeed the Tories insisted that Boris hire Sir Simon as deputy and later chief of staff to add administrative ballast to the mercurial Mayor.