During some of the darkest days of his premiership almost three decades ago, John Major headed to Japan on an official visit, hoping to leave the turmoil inside the Conservative party behind him.
Arguments over Europe were raging at home. The Tory right was in open revolt. The economy was still reeling from aftershocks following the UK’s traumatic exit from the European exchange rate mechanism the year before, and the promised “green shoots” of economic recovery had yet to appear.
