Afzal Khan

MP for Manchester Rusholme

Labour

Afzal Khan CBE is the Labour and Co-operative MP for Manchester Rusholme, having first been elected for the predecessor seat of Manchester Gorton in the 2017 general election.

In the 2024 general election, Khan won 15,054 votes, representing 51.9% of the vote. The Green Party candidate, Thirza Asanga-Rae, received 6,819 votes (23.5%), while the Workers Party candidate, Mohhamed Bilal, secured 3,660 votes (12.6%). Khan was duly elected with a majority of 8,235 votes.

The Manchester Rusholme constituency was newly created for the 2024 election, formed from parts of the former Manchester Central and Manchester Gorton seats. It covers areas including Rusholme, Moss Side, Hulme, and Fallowfield. It is considered a very safe Labour seat.

Political Career

Khan served as trade envoy to Turkey from January 2025 to August 2025. He stood down following his visit to the self-declared Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus.

In his resignation letter, addressed to the prime minister, Khan said he felt it was “best to stand down at this time so not to distract from the hard work the government is doing to secure the best possible trade deals for this country”.

Khan served as shadow minister for exports from September to November 2023, when he resigned from the frontbench.

Khan stepped down to vote in favour of a Scottish National Party (SNP) amendment to the King’s Speech in the House of Commons calling for an “immediate ceasefire” in Gaza – defying the instruction set out by the party’s frontbench. Labour had tabled its own motion, making a more moderate appeal for a “humanitarian pause” in the conflict and ordered its representatives to support that stance.

In a social media post at the time, Khan said: “With 11,000+ Gazans killed, supporting a full [and] immediate ceasefire is the very least we can do.”

Khan’s previous shadow roles include shadow minister for legal aid (2021-2023), shadow deputy leader of the House of Commons (2020-2021), and shadow minister for immigration (2017-2020).

Khan is listed as a member of the all-party parliamentary groups (APPGs) for Bahrain, British Muslims, Greater Manchester, Pakistan and parks and green spaces.

Khan delivered his maiden speech on 19 July 2017 during a debate on tuition fees.

In it, he said: “It is with great pride that I rise to speak representing a constituency in my home city of Manchester. In May, the city I love was the victim of a terrible attack – 22 adults and children were killed and more than 100 people were injured attending a concert at Manchester Arena. It was an act of pure evil.

“Faced with this tragedy, the people of Manchester responded in the only way they know: with solidarity, with compassion, and with the determination that those who seek to endanger our way of life will not succeed.”

He added: “When such events happen there is always a danger that some people will try to use them to divide us, and unfortunately we witnessed an increase in hate crimes in the wake of the attack, yet just a few weeks later the people of Manchester elected me – a Muslim – as the city’s first ever BME MP.

“I cannot think of a more powerful message to the terrorists and bigots that their attempts to divide us will never succeed.”

Before entering parliament, Khan served as the Labour member of the European Parliament (MEP) for North West England from 2014 to 2017.

Prior to that, he was a Labour councillor on Manchester City Council for the Cheetham ward from 2000 to 2015, serving as executive member for children’s services.

He was lord mayor of Manchester from 2005 to 2006.

Political views

Leadership elections and loyalty

Labour deputy leadership 2025: Khan was one of 24 Labour MPs who nominated Bell Ribeiro-Addy for the party’s deputy leadership in September 2025. The election followed the resignation of Angela Rayner, who stepped down as deputy prime minister and deputy party leader after an investigation into her tax affairs. It marked the first time since 2007 that Labour had held a deputy leadership contest while in government.

Ribeiro-Addy, a member of the Socialist Campaign Group (SCG), was seen as the candidate on the left of the party. She secured only 24 nominations from the Parliamentary Labour Party (PLP), far short of the 80 required under rules introduced in 2021.

Labour leadership 2020: Khan was one of 22 Labour who nominated Emily Thornberry for the party’s leadership in early 2020. The election was triggered by the resignation of Jeremy Corbyn following the party’s defeat in the 2019 general election, which resulted in Labour’s fewest seats in the House of Commons since 1935.

Thornberry, then the shadow foreign secretary, was one of five candidates to reach the second stage of the contest. However, she was eliminated from the race on 15 February 2020 after failing to secure the required 33 nominations from Constituency Labour Parties (CLPs) or three affiliated groups. This left Keir Starmer, Rebecca Long-Bailey, and Lisa Nandy as the three candidates on the final membership ballot.

Factional identity and party tradition

Living standards coalition: Khan is a member of the living standards coalition. Established in July 2025, the group’s stated aim was to develop and promote policy ideas that directly reduce everyday costs for households, particularly in areas such as food, energy, housing and childcare. In an open letter published upon its founding, addressed to Keir Starmer, the MPs wrote: “Our constituents will ask one question at the next election: did this Labour government make me better off?”

They added: “To raise living standards, we support government interventions that will help to increase incomes and lower costs.”

Brexit and Europe

Brexit referendum: Khan supported Remain in the 2016 Brexit referendum, and therefore agreed with a majority of constituents, 61.8% of whom also voted to Remain.

Customs union vote (2025): In December 2025, Khan voted in favour of the UK-EU Customs Union (Duty to Negotiate) Bill. The bill, introduced under the 10-minute rule procedure by Liberal Democrat Europe spokesperson Al Pinkerton, sought to mandate the government to enter into negotiations with the European Union to establish a bespoke customs union. In total, 13 Labour MPs joined the Liberal Democrats in supporting the motion, while the majority of the party abstained.

Welfare

Welfare ‘reasoned amendment’ (June 2025): Khan was one of the over 120 Labour MPs to sign the reasoned amendment to the government’s flagship welfare bill which aimed to reject the proposed legislation.

The amendment, in the name of senior Labour MP Dame Meg Hillier, objected to the fact that the bill had not been subject to a “formal consultation with disabled people” and that “250,000 people will be pushed into poverty” as a result of it, according to a government impact assessment.

The motion also called on the government to wait for the publication of the review into the Personal Independence Payment (Pip), helmed by minister Sir Stephen Timms, and the independent review, conducted by Sir Charlie Mayfield, into how the employment of disabled people could be boosted.

Welfare vote (July 2025): Khan went on to abstain over the bill at second reading. The vote came after ministers agreed to significant concessions to avoid defeat via a mass rebellion of Labour MPs on 1 July 2025.

Assisted dying

On the second reading of the Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill (Assisted Dying Bill) in June 2025, Khan did not record a vote. He voted against the Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill, better known as the assisted dying bill, at third reading (June 2025).

Foreign policy and security

IPAC: Khan is a member of the Inter-Parliamentary Alliance on China (IPAC) – an international, cross-party network of legislators from democratic countries focused on relations with the People’s Republic of China. The alliance, established on 4 June 2020, the anniversary of the 1989 Tiananmen Square protests and massacre, was formed to unite “lawmakers worldwide, promoting democracy and addressing threats to the rules-based and human rights systems posed by the rise of China.”

Sanctioned (Russia): In April 2022, Khan was among the group of MPs placed on a sanctions list by the Russian government. The measure barred them from entering Russia and was presented by Moscow as a retaliatory response to the UK’s stance on the invasion of Ukraine.

Palestine

LFPME: Khan has been listed as a member of Labour Friends of Palestine and the Middle East (LFPME). The organisation’s stated aim is to promote peace and justice in the region through the application of international law and respect for human rights.

Palestinian recognition letter (July 2025): In July 2025, Khan was among the over 254 MPs to sign a cross-party letter calling for the government to immediately recognise the state of Palestine. The letter called on the prime minister and foreign secretary to recognise Palestine at the UN Conference then taking place in New York.

Before Politics

Born Mohammed Afzal Khan in Jhelum, Pakistan on 5 April 1958, he moved to the UK aged 12.

He left school without qualifications and worked in various jobs, including as a Greater Manchester Police constable, a bus driver, and a labourer. He later returned to education at Abraham Moss College, studied law at Manchester Polytechnic (now Manchester Metropolitan University), and qualified as a solicitor in 1996.

He served as Assistant Secretary-General of the Muslim Council of Britain. He was appointed a Commander of the Order of the British Empire (CBE) in 2008 for his work on race relations and interfaith understanding.