Labour appointed Battersea MP Marsha de Cordova as its new shadow disabilities minister yesterday.

She replaces St Helens South and Whiston MP Marie Rimmer, who decided to step down from the role.

Ms de Cordova, who is registered blind, took the south-west London seat this year with a 10-point swing to Labour to boot out the Tory incumbent.

She used her first appearance at the dispatch box to ask Disability Minister Penny Mordaunt when the government would respond to findings by the United Nations that its benefits regime for sick and disabled people is a “human catastrophe.”

Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn congratulated Ms de Cordova on her new job, saying she “brings a wealth of experience to the role and will help us continue to expose the failings of this Conservative government that has even been found wanting by the UN over its treatment of disabled people.”

Shadow work and pensions secretary Debbie Abrahams added: “Marsha came to Parliament with a strong record of campaigning for the rights of blind and partially sighted people, and quickly established herself here as a passionate and committed defender of our social security system.”