Mapped: All the MPs standing down at the next election

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Former sports minister Tracey Crouch has become the latest MP to announce that she will not stand for office at the next general election.

Ms Crouch, who represents Chatham and Aylesford in Kent and recently overcame a cancer diagnosis, said that her decision was “entirely personal and positive”.

The MP said coming out the other side of cancer treatment had been a “life-affirming experience” and that “I truly believe it is time to seek a new professional challenge”.

“We spend far too much time in our relatively short lives putting things off but at some point you have to say to yourself if not now, when and for me I have realised that when is now.”

Ms Crouch joins a growing number of Conservative MPs deciding to quit politics, including several high-profile ex-cabinet secretaries and other ministers. So far this year six Conservative MPs have announced they will not stand at the next election.

Alok Sharma, the former business secretary and Cop26 president, Sajid Javid, the former health secretary, Dominic Raab, the ex-justice secretary and Ben Wallace, the former defence secretary, are among the other big-name Tories who have called it a day as their party struggles in the polls.

Mr Sharma and Mr Raab, who resigned from his cabinet position following a slew of bullying allegations which he denied, would have been defending majorities of fewer than 5,000 votes at the next national poll.

Most MPs walking away from Westminster are Conservatives, which is unsurprising given they are the biggest party, winning 365 seats at the 2019 election.

According to the Institute for Government, the 2010 election saw more than 100 MPs stand down, mainly from the Labour Party, which had been in power since 1997.

Some MPs also announced they were standing down after the expenses scandal the same year.

Of all the 89 MPs standing down ahead of the next national poll - expected in the spring or autumn of this year - 56 are Conservative.

Harriet Harman, the former Labour leader, Margaret Beckett, the former foreign secretary, and Ben Bradshaw, the former culture secretary are among the 16  Labour MPs standing down.

Nine SNP MPs, six independents - including former health secretary Matt Hancock - one Green and one Plaid Cymru have also decided to call it a day.