ABOUT ME

Tony Vaughan’s election in 2024 was historically significant for two reasons; he was the first ever Labour MP for Folkestone and Hythe and is the first ever MP of Filipino heritage. Hard work, respect and empathy are values he learnt from his parents; they guided his life as a student, barrister and now, as a Labour MP.

Tony’s mother came from the island of Samar in the Philippines to Britain in the 1970s, having been born in 1943 during the Japanese occupation. She initially worked as a cleaner, before training as a nurse. She continued to work as a care assistant for over 3 decades. Tony’s father, an English engineer from London, was an alumnus of Swansea University, studying chemical engineering. Tony attended Hitchens Boys School, where he learned the value of hard work, performing well and achieving grade 8 piano with distinction. He received an offer from Cambridge University to study Law. While at Cambridge, Vaughan was elected President of St Catharine’s College Law Society and was a dedicated swimmer, earning 2 blues for representing the University. Tony later completed a Master of Laws degree at the University of London (School of Oriental and African Studies) specialising in human rights and equality law.

His political journey began with his experiences starting out in the legal profession. After Cambridge, Tony pursued human rights law. Rather than apply for positions at various chambers straight after university, which would have been the standard route, Vaughan wanted to put legal theory into practice through making a difference to people’s lives. He travelled to Jamaica to work on death row cases with the Independent Jamaica Council for Human Rights in Kingston, aided by a grant from the European Commission, before volunteering with Jamaicans for Justice on cases of police brutality. His desire to work on social justice issues led him to Guatemala, where he worked at the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights through the NGO “Rights Action”, representing vulnerable indigenous banana workers facing corruption and assassination. These experiences for Vaughan revealed the structural injustice that thrived in places such as Jamaica and Guatemala. He left both countries determined to fight for social justice, convinced that he could play a role in utilising his legal expertise to advance it.

After attending university, Vaughan was called to the Bar at the Inner Temple in 2006 following completion of vocational training at the College of Law. He completed pupillage at Garden Court Chambers.  The chambers’ reputation for representing miners and its anti-racism stance resonated with Vaughan’s political values.

Vaughan’s legal writing portfolio is extensive, featuring co-authorship of “mmigration Law and Practice in Family Proceedings”. He has also made contributions to several key legal texts, specifically “Macdonald’s Immigration Law and Practice”, “Human Trafficking and Modern Slavery”, the “Asylum Support Handbook”, and “Human Rights in Criminal Law”. Furthermore, his work has been published in peer-reviewed journals, including “Judicial Review” and the “Journal of Immigration Asylum and Nationality Law”. Complementing his writing, Vaughan served on the “Equality and Human Rights Commission’s Panel of Counsel” from 2019 to 2024 and sat as an “Independent Funding Adjudicator” for the Legal Aid Agency.

 Throughout his legal career, Vaughan honed his public speaking and analytical skills, working closely with King’s Counsels (KCs) and setting his sights on achieving this prestigious rank. Around eight months into the Covid-19 pandemic, he moved from Garden Court to Doughty Street Chambers specialising in public law, human rights and equality law conducting oral advocacy in all courts including the UK Supreme Court. He. He was appointed King’s Counsel in March 2025.

The death of his father’s cousin, a fellow lawyer, in 2022, served as a stark reminder that “life is short,” further cementing his resolve to enter politics and fight for social justice at the highest level. Working as a barrister under the harsh austerity policies of Conservative Governments and seeing firsthand the impact of austerity on legal aid provision and the courts system, gave Tony the drive to be the one “making that policy or making those decisions”.

In 2017, Vaughan became involved with his local Labour Party in Folkestone, campaigning on issues such as leading opposition against a regeneration scheme of a historic harbour area in Folkestone and ensuring greater access to GP services. Vaughan provided free legal advice to assist vulnerable patients of the now closed Folkestone East Family Practice to find new surgeries. He ran unsuccessfully to be the Labour Party candidate for the Dover constituency in 2022. He served as the trustee of South Kent Mind of which he is now Patron.

In July 2024, Vaughan was elected to Parliament. He has pledged to “fight every day to improve constituents’ lives and be [their] voice in Parliament” to make the area “the best it can be for everyone,” noting that the constituency was “forgotten by Westminster” for many years. Vaughan has stated that his top priorities are expanding local NHS services, securing the future of Dungeness Power Station and improving water quality. His legal background as a King’s Counsel (KC), earned outside of a ministerial role, gives him a trusted and unique standing within Parliament.

Vaughan used his first Parliamentary question to raise the issue of new nuclear at Dungeness power station. He speaks frequently in Parliament on a range of local and national issues:

• In September 2024, following the abrupt July closure of the Folkestone Sports Centre, Vaughan initiated a campaign to protect the popular local leisure centre from property developers. He established the campaign group “Save Folkestone Sports Centre,” which successfully applied to register the Centre as an Asset of Community Value under the Localism Act 2011 and pressured officials to ensure the site was acquired for continued leisure use. The Sports Trust ultimately acquired the site.
• In early 2025, Vaughan successfully lobbied the Government for a significant funding boost to the Folkestone and Hythe’s flood defence programme. This effort resulted in a £2.5 million grant being made to the Council later that year, which will protect thousands of properties from flooding.

• He is currently campaigning to bring high-speed rail back to Ashford International station, which he identifies as a crucial catalyst for local economic regeneration.

• Following his lobbying for support to expand neighbourhood healthcare services, the Government announced that Folkestone and Hythe would be one of only six areas in the Southeast to take part in the new Neighbourhood Health Team pilot project, with the goal of creating a national blueprint for community health services.

Vaughan wants to help build a society that is “more rights respecting”, where there is greater social justice, equality of opportunity, an active state and a fairer distribution of income and wealth. This opportunity society would consist of more vocational educational and cultural opportunities for young people.

In October 2025, Tony Vaughan KC was elected to the Justice Select Committee. He also Co-Chairs the APPG on Refugees, where he is passionate about reform of Britain’s asylum and migration system, bringing about peace in Palestine and securing a viable Palestinian state. As the Chair of the All-Party Parliamentary China Group, Tony is focussed on forging a pragmatic and stable British foreign policy towards China and creating more export opportunities for British businesses, especially small and medium-sized firms, in the Indo Pacific.

Vaughan has both spoken and written on the critical importance of the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR) to the UK. He views the ECHR as a necessary tool to help resolve the irregular migration crisis and as a fundamental embodiment of British values. While he has expressed caution against generating high expectations for any reform of the Convention’s text itself, he has clearly distinguished this stance from domestic reform of UK laws. Additionally, he has publicly criticised Conservative proposals to withdraw the UK from the ECHR, branding such a move “Brexit 2.0.”

As part of Vaughan’s role on the Legal Affairs Committee of the Council of Europe, he is examining how frozen Russian assets can fund compensation awards against Russia, including to compensate Ukrainian victims of Russia’s war of aggression.

Vaughan is a trusted voice in the House of Commons, being the only Labour MP, with the exception of the Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer, to have earned the rank of KC through practice at the Bar.

Vaughan is married with two children. He is a devoted labrador owner, and remains a keen swimmer, climber, and runner.