The beeping of a mobile was the first audible sign that business lobbying over sweeping reforms of company law had gone dramatically awry, the texts a portent of a damaging breakdown in relations between ministers and industry in the past week.

Jonathan Djanogly recalls how he got a series of "panic messages" on his phone first thing in the morning on October 17. The Conservative trade and industry spokesman, leading for his party in the Commons on the companies bill, had a stream of messages from business and investor bodies "all asking what was going on".