The Prime Minister’s announcement, today, that she’s going to hold a general election on June 8, has thrown the Manchester Gorton by-election into a whole new light.

Until this morning it was a hotly anticipated contest to see how much (if any) of their 24,079 margin Corbyn’s Labour could manage to retain. Now, with the by-election taking place after Parliament is dissolved for the general election, the winning candidate will not even get to take their seat before having to re-contest it.

Here’s your quick guide to the newly irrelevant by-election:

Who are the candidates?

Nobody cares. Quite possibly they will out-number the voters.

What issues will the by-election be fought upon?

Nobody cares. This is a perfect opportunity for minority issues, such as “Shall we rename the constituency to ‘Gordon’?”, “Do we want fewer trains on telly” and “Is it ‘scone’ or ‘scone’?”, to come to the fore. With turnout predicted to be in the high 8s only one thing is certain…that we still won’t know for certain afterwards.

When is the closing date to register to vote?

Doesn’t matter.

Will Labour retain the seat?

If they do nobody will care. If they don’t then exactly the same people will care.

How intense will the press coverage be?

The Manchester Evening News is provisionally reserving 4 column inches below the fold on page 8 to cover the story, but they stress that this may be dropped if Kerry Katona is spotted in the region again.

Is George Galloway still running?

Yes.

Oh god, is he still a massive cock?

Also yes.