United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland

More women MPs have been elected to the House of Commons than ever before, according to the Press Association news agency, breaking the previous record of 208 set in 2017.

Every general election is haunted by the ghosts of campaigns past.

A century ago, Nancy Astor made the train journey from her constituency in Plymouth, a city on the coast of southwest England, to London. There, on Dec. 1, 1919, she took her seat in Parliament — the first woman in British history to do so.

Every general election is haunted by the ghosts of campaigns past. The most significant spectre in 2019 has to be Nancy Astor, who on December 1 1919 was the first woman to take her seat in the House of Commons as an elected member of the UK parliament – and to whom a statue was unveiled in Plymouth on November 28, the anniversary of her election. One wonders what she would make of the gender politics of this campaign.