Rising star Mahmood seen as hard on crime and possible party leader

Shabana Mahmood knows what it's like to live in an area where crime feels out of control.

- Eleni Courea

Shabana Mahmood knows what it's like to live in an area where crime feels out of control. While she was growing up in Small Heath in inner-city Birmingham in the 1980s and 90s, her father kept a cricket bat behind the till of the family shop to fend off would-be robbers.

Three decades later Mahmood is serving as Labour's justice secretary and lord chancellor, tasked with cutting crime at a time when public concern about it is rising. Though violent crime has fallen steadily over decades, recent increases in highly visible offences, including shoplifting and snatch theft, have contributed to a feeling of lawlessness and insecurity.

Fanning the flames are politicians including Nigel Farage, the Reform UK leader, and Robert Jenrick, Mahmood's Conservative counterpart, who have sought to link crime – particularly sexual assault – and immigration.

For Mahmood, being the daughter of immigrants is central to her world view about justice. "She feels strongly that being British is a responsibility as well as a right," a source close to her said. "She feels like it's an affront when people who come here are afforded the welcome she and her family were, but break the laws of the land."

Another politician shaped by his upbringing by immigrant parents was Rishi Sunak, who felt strongly that it was an injustice for people to arrive illegally in Britain on small boats. Though their backgrounds and politics are very different, Mahmood and Sunak crossed paths at Oxford University in the late 90s, with a teenage Sunak pledging his support for Mahmood when she stood for president of the Lincoln College student union.