Lib Dems target Hunt for their own Portillo moment

Party aims at big guns as Labour turn fire on Shapps and Mordaunt

- Jitendra Joshi

VETERANS of the 1997 election remember the shock fall of Michael Portillo. This time, several Conservative big-hitters are vulnerable with the Liberal Democrats targeting key bricks of the "Blue Wall" across southern England.

Top of the Lib-Dem hitlist for this year's "Portillo moment" is Chancellor Jeremy Hunt, who in 2019 won a majority of 8,817 in South West Surrey. That would already be marginal given the state of the polls today and recent by-election results. But boundary changes mean that his new constituency of Godalming and Ash is very much in Opposition sights.

Lib-Dem leader Sir Ed Davey was planting his flag deep in enemy territory today with a visit to Cheltenham, where Justice Secretary Alex Chalk is defending a tiny majority of 981.

The party is even making a play at Surrey Heath, where Michael Gove won a majority of 18,349 last time. It has drawn heart from this month's local elections when it gained ground in former home secretary Suella Braverman's Hampshire backyard.