One person, each day, to help make sense of the election.
Polls are predicting a Labour landslide that could result in the party winning around 450 seats. But the national picture obscures the very real threat facing not one but two shadow cabinet ministers. The first is Thangam Debbonaire, MP for Bristol Central since 2015, who is fighting to save her seat from Green co-leader Carla Denyer. Debbonaire was appointed a shadow arts minister while receiving treatment for breast cancer; she resigned during the so-called “chicken coup” against Jeremy Corbyn and remained on the backbenches until Keir Starmer promoted her to the shadow cabinet. She is now shadow culture secretary. The other senior Labour figure whose seat is at risk: Shabana Mahmood, the shadow justice secretary, is fighting the George Galloway-endorsed independent Akhmed Yakoob. Labour may be about to lose two experienced female politicians just when it needs them most.
Further reading: Akhmed Yakoob: Galloway-backed election candidate mired in misogynism row
