6 ways Black Country and Shropshire seats will shape the outcome of the General Election

And David Dimbleby famously said Margaret Thatcher was at risk of losing her majority in 1987.

So I'll make just two predictions regarding the seats in the West Midlands in the General Election 2024.

Labour's Warrinder Juss will comfortably take Wolverhampton West from the Conservatives, and Mark Pritchard will be re-elected in The Wrekin.

Ok, not exactly putting my neck on the line here, am I? When Mike Newton was selected as the Conservative candidate for Wolverhampton West, he joked that he might have picked a longer straw.

The area – which for many decades was a Conservative stronghold under Enoch Powell and Nick Budgen – is No. 5 on Labour's target list, with a notional majority of just 934 for the Conservatives.

A swing of just 0.92 per cent is needed for Mr Juss to take the seat, and if Mr Newton is successful in defying the odds, he will likely have helped secure Rishi Sunak another five years in No. 10.

Similarly, it would take a brave individual to bet against Mark Pritchard against holding his seat in The Wrekin.

Again, historically it has swung between Labour and the Conservatives, and was indeed held by Labour for 18 years under Bruce Grocott and then Peter Bradley, but since his first election in 2005, Mr Pritchard has steadily increased his majority.

Boundary changes mean Mr Pritchard is now defending a notional majority of 21,173, and a national swing of more than 20 per cent would be required.

Mr Pritchard would doubtless say nothing can be taken for granted.

But the Tories would need to be totally obliterated for Labour's Roh Yakobi to stand any chance of taking the seat.

We can expect the result to be tighter than in recent elections, but it would be stretch to far so see anything other than a Conservative win.

So what will the other seats mean for the national picture? It would be a major upset if Labour were not to take Walsall and Bloxwich, West Bromwich and Tipton and Wednesbury, the classic 'red wall' seats which have traditionally been Labour strongholds, but have moved towards the Conservatives in the wake of the Brexit referendum. Of the three, Tipton and Wednesbury will require the biggest swing at 6.14 per cent, but Labour would be very disappointed if it did not take all three.

Boundary changes mean that Shrewsbury, rather than Telford, will be Labour's top target in Shropshire. Politically, the constituency is quite an eclectic mix of left-leaning urban hipsters and rural Tory voters. The seat has been held by Conservative Daniel Kawczynski since 2005, but if he manages to hold on this time, it means voters will not only have confounded the pollsters, but will leave the outcome of the election wide open.

The real bellwether, though, will come in Wolverhampton North East, No. 108 on the target list. With a majority of 7,847, in more normal times Conservative Jane Stevenson would be expected to stand a pretty good chance of re-election. But it is also something of a 'red wall' seat which has traditionally voted Labour. The 9.92 per cent swing required is a major challenge, but the minimum that Labour will require if it is to form the next government. If Sereena Brackenbridge wins here, it probably means Sir Keir Starmer will be bound for Downing Street. If Miss Stevenson wins, it's game on.

Those are Labour's must-win seats. But it is the next tier of constituencies, the ones that would normally be 'safe' Tory seats, that will determine whether the predicted Labour win becomes a rout.

Sir Keir will have big hopes for Telford, historically a strong Labour seat, but now with a notional Conservative majority of 10,900. A strongly eurosceptic area, Labour will need to make a 12.52 per cent swing here. But the defection of former MP Lucy Allan to Reform UK, and a strong campaign by Shaun Davies, leader of Telford & Wrekin Council, will give Labour confidence. Stafford, which requires a 13.37 per cent swing, and Halesowen which will require a 13.82 per cent swing, are also in Labour's sights. Across the boundary in Mid Wales, the Conservatives have withdrawn support for candidate Craig Williams in the wake of the betting scandal. It would take a swing of 14.42 per cent for Labour to overturn his majority of 14,765. If Labour wins these four seats, Sir Keir will be looking at a 100-plus majority.

The size of the Reform UK vote will probably determine which way the next two seats fall. On paper, the 16.12 per cent swing required for Labour to take Dudley and the 16.32 per cent to take Stourbridge looks a tall order. But polls suggest that Reform will take a big chunk of the Tory vote in these strongly eurosceptic seats. If Labour takes these, the party will be in 'super-majority' territory.

That leaves the likes of Aldridge-Brownhills, Cannock Chase and Wyre Forest, where the Conservatives hold notional majorities of more than 20,000. If Labour takes these, we would be in uncharted territory, although the fact that Sir Keir chose to visit Cannock Chase this week suggests that he sees nowhere as off-limits.

While most of the focus will be on Labour and the Conservatives, it is also worth keeping an eye out for the Liberal Democrats in Shropshire. In 2019, Owen Paterson won North Shropshire for the Conservatives with a notional majority of more than 20,000, with the Liberal Democrats coming a distant third. But the 2021 by-election saw Liberal Democrat Helen Morgan take the seat with an historic 34.2 per cent swing. Mrs Morgan retaining the seat would not grab the same headlines as a Labour win in Aldridge-Brownhills, but it would mark a huge shift in voter patterns nevertheless. Mrs Morgan this week claimed that her party was also targeting South Shropshire, where the Tories have a notional majority of 28,636. That would be a truly remarkable turnaround.

In summary - how the Black Country, Staffordshire and Shropshire could shape the General Election result:

The Tories win Wolverhampton West: Conservatives pull off an unexpected win with a majority of at least 90

The Tories win Shrewsbury: The party has a good chance of being the largest party but may not have a working majority

Labour wins Wolverhampton North East: They are at least the largest party. The seat is a classic bellweather, indicating how the national poll will go

Labour wins Telford: The party wins nationally, with a majority of at least 60 and comfortably enough to form a government

Labour wins Stafford: It can expect a big majority nationally, of at least 100, and consign the Tories to Opposition

Labour wins Wrekin: The Tories have been destroyed and Labour romp home with a majority that could stretch to 300 or more