Once parliament is dissolved after midnight, the campaign for the December general election will begin.
As well as announcing manifestos, delivering speeches, and doorstepping potential voters, party leaders take part in televised election debates. The first of these will take place on November 19.
Boris Johnson and Jeremy Corbyn will be invited to these debates - but spaces for other leaders and senior figures is up to the broadcasters.
The invitation for the ITV debate has not been extended to Lib Dem leader Jo Swinson.
Her colleague Chuka Umunna argues that it sends a "terrible message when it comes to equality".
However, a former BBC editorial director says that he struggles to see the case for Swinson.
The Claim
Chuka Umunna argues that Swinson has a "greater mandate" than any Lib Dem leader to participate in the ITV debate.
In an article for the Independent, the Lib Dem MP asks ITV what they are playing at by excluding Swinson from its leaders' debate.
He says that the decision to exclude the only woman, who leads a UK-wide political party that has a chance to be in the government, sends a "terrible message when it comes to equality".
Umunna argues: "If anything, Jo has a greater claim than Nick [Clegg] to being included in the debates between the main party leaders this time round.
"Brexit was not on the radar in 2010 and it dominates everything now - it is the key issue. Brexit is the reason we are even having an early election...
"The Lib Dems are the biggest and strongest Remain party."
The former Labour MP adds that the Lib Dems will not rest until ITV include Swinson in the debate to "ensure those who want to stop Brexit are heard".
The Counterclaim
However, the New Statesman's Roger Mosey explains why ITV should be allowed to air a head-to-head debate between Corbyn and Johnson alone.
The former BBC TV News head says that from an editorial standpoint, he struggles to see the case for including Swinson.
He says that broadcasters will take past performances into account - in particular, how they performed in the previous general election - and this means that not all parties are treated equally in terms of airtime.
Mosey writes: "This is where the Lib Dems hit a problem. In the 2017 general election, the Conservatives had 42 per cent of the vote and Labour had 40 per cent - while the Lib Dems were on 7.4 per cent.
"Within parliament, the Lib Dems were only one-third of the size of the SNP.
"There is a sharp contrast with 10 years ago, when the Lib Dems were unequivocally the third force in British politics with a much bigger number of MPs and a massively higher share of the vote - hence the Brown, Cameron and Clegg debates being relatively uncontroversial in their format."
The Facts
The ITV leaders' debate will be the first TV debate of the general election campaign. It will be hosted by news presenter Julie Etchingham, and broadcast on November 19.
After the head-to-head debate between Johnson and Corbyn, the Conservatives, Labour, the Liberal Democrats, the Brexit Party, the Scottish National Party, and the Green Party will be invited to take part in a live interview-based programme.
ITV also plans to hold a multi-party debate in the run-up to December 12 with the Tories, Labour, Lib Dems, SNP, Brexit Party and Plaid Cymru represented by either their leaders or senior figures.
Sky News has proposed a live televised election debate on November 28. They originally planned for a head-to-head between Johnson and Corbyn, but have now invited Swinson, who has accepted. The Tory and Labour leaders have not responded at the time of writing.
The Times reports that the BBC is looking to host a Question Time-style event, along with one-on-one interviews with Andrew Neil - but this has yet to be confirmed.
A YouGov poll, published on Monday, found that more than half of voters (53 per cent) believe Swinson should be invited to take part in the debate, while 26 per cent disagreed.
Around three quarters of Remain voters (73 per cent) say that the Lib Dem leader should be involved - compared to only 38 per cent of Leave voters.
