It’s the edited diaries of Simon Hart, who was Conservative MP for Carmarthen West and South Pembrokeshire from 2010 until 2024. He was Chief Whip under Rishi Sunak, Secretary of State for Wales and Parliamentary Secretary for the Cabinet Office under Boris Johnson. He was previously Chief Executive of the Countryside Alliance.

The book starts in the heady hours after the 2019 general election victory for Boris Johnson. The Conservatives are returned to office with an overall majority of 40 seats in the Commons, sweeping all before them. There is much jubilation in the Tory ranks.

The book then traces, hour by hour, the slow deterioration of the Tory political fortunes from that December 2019 pinnacle to the nadir of the July 2024 general election hammering, just four and a half years later, when it seemed that anything the Tories did, however praiseworthy, wouldn’t shift the dial of public opinion. Mr Hart concluded that the voters had made their mind up about the Tories two years previously (perhaps during the brief lettuceship of LibDem Special Agent Truss?), and didn’t even mind helping Labour in by voting Reform, as long as they didn’t vote Tory.

I did have high hopes for this book. A couple of salacious and amusing passages were dangled in the press. I thought Mr Hart would turn out to be an Alan Clark-like writer. There were, indeed, several references to woodcock shooting, champagne quaffing and the like. And I did enjoy reading the book. There are some laugh-out-loud moments. But Simon Hart doesn’t reach Alan Clark levels, and perhaps it was unfair to have that expectation.

Instead, this is a good solid, engaging book which explains, from behind the scenes, how the Tories disintegrated. There are some fairly withering descriptions of Boris Johnson, Liz Truss, Nadine Dorries, Suella Braverman and others. Some people come out well – Rishi Sunak seems, from Hart’s description, a very good guy who earnestly studies the detail before making a decision.

Simon Hart appears to be an honest, good-hearted individual leading the whips team well and looking after MPs who are ,at times, infuriating and, at other times, admirable.

If you want to know how a chief whip works, under very trying circumstances, then this is the tome for you.

One pragmatic point comes out throughout the book, and it is something that perhaps applies to all parties. It’s the author’s consistent “soapbox rant” subject. He deals with MPs who appear to be completely out of their depth in some key areas. He concludes that the one thing that is crying out for improvement is the process of selecting, approving and training MPs. Team management and people management skills seem to be lacking in many of them. Judging from some of the encounters that Hart has, lessons in humility and what the Americans call “reality therapy” might not go amiss either.

All in all, this is a very good read for political anoraks. It is good to have the benefit of Simon Hart’s detailed insight, so soon after the actual tumultuous events took place.

“Ungovernable” is published by PanMacmillan.

* Paul Walter is a Liberal Democrat activist and member of the Liberal Democrat Voice team. He blogs at Liberal Burblings.