A host of high-profile lawyer Conservatives face losing their seat in the forthcoming general election as the party continues to lag in the polls. Lord chanellor Alex Chalk, attorney general Victoria Prentis and former lord chancellor Robert Buckland are all likely to lose their seats, according to latest polling.
Due to a clutch of retirements and these vulnerable seats, it may be that the only survivor of the 10 lord chancellors to fill the role since 2010 could be former prime minister Liz Truss. Chris Grayling, Michael Gove, Dominic Raab and Brandon Lewis are all standing down at this election, while Ken Clarke, David Gauke and David Lidington all left parliament in 2019.
Chalk looks particularly unlikely to retain his Cheltenham seat, which he held at the last election with a majority of less than 1,000 and where bookmakers have the Liberal Democrats at 1/8 to win.
Buckland has a majority of more than 6,000 in South Swindon but is vulnerable: Labour are odds-on to win the seat.
Prentis has on paper a much easier task to defend a 16,800 majority in Banbury – a constituency which has delivered a Conservative MP in every election since 1922. But she too faces a challenge from Labour, who are marginal favourites.
Barrister Lucy Frazer, a former justice minister, faces a fight to hold off the Liberal Democrats in the new seat of Ely and East Cambridgeshire, as does solicitor Helen Grant in Maidstone and Malling, despite beating Labour in 2019 by more than 20,000 votes.
Solicitor Simon Clarke took Middlesbrough South and East Cleveland for the Conservatives for the first time in 2017, but he too is considered to be an outsider despite having a majority of more than 11,000.
The only incumbent Conservative lawyer expected to win comfortably is Sir Geoffrey Cox, who is the clear favourite to win the new seat of Torridge and Tavistock.
