This week Rishi Sunak is mainly defying the Tory right. The British prime minister’s recent political strategies have had the lifespan of a mayfly but, with his latest reshuffle, he appears to have reached an important and accurate conclusion — there is no point in trying to appease unbiddable hardliners who never wanted him there in the first place.

By sacking Suella Braverman as home secretary, and bringing back David Cameron as foreign secretary, Sunak has ensured the top three jobs in his government are now in the hands of centre-right pragmatists, even if the older all-male line-up hardly projects the image of change he seeks to claim.