There is a scenario for next week’s Tory conference in Blackpool which sees the party unite in the face of an imminent election, rally behind David Cameron and defy the media and Labour ministers preparing for a bloodbath.

It is a scenario to which I subscribe. The Conservatives may be in a depressed state, but are they suicidal? On balance, I think the answer is that most of them are not. But Mr Cameron will be living on his nerves for three long conference days and nights before he makes one of the most important speeches of his life on Wednesday.

No doubt he will make a good speech - he usually does - but will the party have imploded before then? Could John Bercow, a Tory liberal, or some other disillusioned MP defect to Labour on the eve of the conference? Will the Tory right keep quiet?

Reading Norman Tebbit’s comments in The Times today makes me wonder whether there really are some elements in the party who would rather maintain the ideological purity of Thatcherism than win an election. It is all so reminiscent of Labour in the 1980s.

Lord Tebbit pours scorn on Mr Cameron - the "public relations guy" - whom he claims has never spent much time in the real world. Gordon Brown, by contrast, is a "clever man" for whom the Chingford Polecat has "considerable regard".

In better times Mr Cameron might actually welcome an attack from Tebbo in the way that Tony Blair used to like being attacked by the unions. It suggests he is actually changing the party.

But in his weakened state, Lord Tebbit is a menace. He also represents a faction in the Tory party which seems to genuinely prefer Gordon Brown’s flag-waving Labour leadership to what they see is the limp-wristed Conservatism offered by Mr Cameron.

If the Tory right (and its cheerleaders in the Daily Mail and Daily Telegraph) succeed next week they could mortally wound Mr Cameron. But what would their annointed successor - David Davis - inherit? A smouldering ruin of a party coming to terms with its fourth electoral humiliation in a row.

Is that what they really want? Worryingly for Mr Cameron, the answer may be Yes.