Dear readers — it’s crunch time. The Gorton and Denton by-election that you presumably either can’t get enough of, or alternatively have really, really had enough of, is almost upon us. Polling day is next Thursday.
Because of this, we’re dubbing this week ‘By-election Week’. Over the next few days we intend to bring you in-depth profiles on all three frontrunners in the race: kicking things off today with Labour’s Angeliki Stogia. Then in a few days Ophira will recount her time spent wandering around Gorton with the Greens' Hannah Spencer — who actually tread the floorboards of Mill HQ on Monday for our podcast. Hannah and Ophira talked smear campaigns, dodgy tactics, millionaire husbands, being an ‘aristocratic heat pump installer’, and discussed what the plumber will do if she becomes the first Green MP in the north. You can listen here, or at the Spotify player below.
Meanwhile Jack Walton has the enviable task of tracking down Reform’s Matt Goodwin, who has not responded to our interview requests as of yet. If you see him around, let him know we’re looking for him, and if you’ve got any insights on him, please let Jack know!
But one quick note before we begin. We believe that our by-election coverage is in the public interest, and therefore should be free. This means we’re not paywalling any of our articles this week. All you have to do to read them is sign up, for free.
Still, if you like what we do and want to support us, consider joining us as a member today. It’s only £8.95 a month, and you’d be allowing us to do this again moving forward: Give Manchester in-depth political coverage, for free to those who can’t afford it.
While we're making all of this week's by-election coverage free, that doesn't mean it's free to produce. Our journalists have been out with the candidates, speaking to voters, critics, supporters, gossipers and everybody in between to try and give you the best sense of the people standing to represent Gorton and Denton.
It's a theme we plan on carrying into May's local elections, as part of our campaign pledge to fund a dedicated reporter to get beyond the headlines and make sure voters across Greater Manchester are as well informed as possible.
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That’s all for now — enjoy by-election week. And for those of you who are sick of it, hold tight, it’ll be over soon.
Amaze your kids with the wonders of space
Horrible Science: Comic Chaos, a new family exhibition, is now on at the Science and Industry Museum. Learn what a star smells like, see a life-size satellite and try to withstand a moonquake, all without leaving Manchester.
Produced in collaboration with hit BBC TV show Horrible Science, this sensory journey through space and time introduces children to the mind-boggling forces that shape our universe. It’s here in Manchester for the remainder of the year before heading down to the Science Museum in London in 2027. Click below for more information.
Angeliki Stogia is in a political streetfight, can she get out alive?
Angeliki Stogia has just had a little win. We’re in a chai shop on Longsight high street, one of many with Vote Labour stickers in the window, and a campaigner is showing her how well a recent clip of her at a hustings is doing. It’s the one where she greets Matt Goodwin — Reform UK’s candidate, from St Albans — with the words: “welcome to Manchester”. It’s sharing well. Stogia, a local councillor whose demeanor is homespun, earnest, and altogether very nice, does a little fist-pump.
Clips like that one have been traded, like blows, by the candidates in the Gorton and Denton by-election race on social media. It’s a race that, over its brief lifespan, has turned even uglier than usual. Leaflets lead with “Labour are done!” and “the Greens are misleading voters”. “The Greens will turn Gorton and Denton into one big crack den” tweeted Goodwin.
Every key contender has had questions raised about their campaign strategies, and canvassers on the doors aren’t just telling voters what's bad about the other parties, they’re telling them the other candidates could tear the community asunder, that they resent their constituents, or that the party they represent could spell the demise of the country as we know it.
The last parliamentary election Stogia stood in was the 2024 general election, in Eddisbury, Cheshire: a far more lowkey affair. Most of the coverage back then was from the Nantwich News and Chester Standard. Stogia’s main opposition was the Conservative Aphra Brandreth, the daughter of broadcaster Gyles Brandreth — a man known best for his cosy knitted jumpers. Brandreth’s main campaign messages were about greenbelt development and getting more women into parliament. Stogia ran on the same campaign message she’s running on now: one of community. Brandreth won with a 3,000 vote majority.
This time, the whole county is watching, and Stogia’s current competitors, Reform’s Goodwin (a GBNews presenter, and academic-turned-rightwing commentator) and Green’s Hannah Spencer (a Trafford councillor who works as a plumber), are out for blood. At one hustings, Goodwin lumped Stogia in with “Labour politicians who turned a blind eye to the mass abuse of working class children,” referencing conspiracies that Labour politicians covered up grooming gangs. At another, Spencer said the people of Gorton and Denton deserve more than “bland Labour politicians”. By comparison, following the Eddisbury election Brandreth thanked her fellow candidates for being “interested in doing the best for everybody in Chester South and Eddisbury”.
Goodwin and Spencer also have one key advantage: their party isn’t an imploding government with a deeply unpopular Prime Minister. On top of that, the seat’s previous Labour MP, Andrew Gwynne, stood down after leaked WhatsApp messages showed him and local Labour councillors deriding constituents, even wishing death on one elderly resident. And Stogia is entering a race that, for the last year, was predicted to be easily retained by Andy Burnham until Labour’s NEC blocked him from standing.
So while Goodwin and Spencer ride the wave of their ascendant parties, Stogia is swimming against the tide. Depending on who you talk to, she’s either been thrown to wolves, or should be admired for taking on a losing battle. But to her own mind, she’s stepping into a race that her entire career has been building up to: “Everything I have ever done, at work and in the party, led me to this campaign.” But does she have what it takes?
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