Chris Vince

MP for Harlow

Chris Vince is the Labour and Co-operative MP for Harlow, having first been elected to parliament at the 2024 general election.

In the 2024 general election, Vince won 16,313 votes, representing 37.6% of the vote. The Conservative candidate, Hannah Ellis, received 13,809 votes (31.8%), while the Reform UK candidate Malcolm Featherstone secured 9,461 votes (21.8%). Vince was duly elected with a majority of 2,504.

The Harlow constituency is located in Essex in the East of England. It is considered a bellwether seat, having changed hands between Labour and the Conservatives over several decades.

Vince’s immediate predecessor as the MP for Harlow was Robert Halfon of the Conservative Party, who held the seat from 2010 to 2024.

Political Career

Vince currently serves as a parliamentary private secretary (PPS) in the Home Office. A PPS acts as an unpaid parliamentary assistant, providing a link between the senior frontbencher and backbench MPs. The role is widely regarded as the first step on the ministerial ladder. Although they cannot speak for the government in debates, a PPS is bound by collective responsibility and becomes part of the so-called “payroll vote”, expected to support the official line in all divisions. Vince was appointed to this role in July 2026, following the Labour leadership contest and Andy Burnham’s elevation as prime minister.

Vince served as a PPS in the Ministry of Housing, Communities, and Local Government from May to July 2026. His appointment to this PPS role was part of a targeted reshuffle designed to stabilise Keir Starmer’s position as prime minister after a series of resignations. At least four PPSs stepped down calling for Starmer to resign or set out a timetable for his departure.

As such, Vince was among the over 100 Labour MPs who signed the May 2026 joint statement insisting it was “no time for a leadership contest.”

The statement read: “Last week we had a devastatingly tough set of election results. It shows we have a hard job ahead to win back trust from the electorate.

“That job needs to start today – with all of us working together to deliver the change the country needs.

“We must focus on that. This is no time for a leadership contest.”

Vince is a member of the Co-operative Party national executive committee (NEC) (since 2020).

Vince has sat as a member of the House of Commons education committee (2025-2026), backbench business committee (2024-2026) and modernisation committee (2025).

Vince delivered his maiden speech on 24 July 2024.

In it, he said: “My background is one of service. I spent 15 years as a secondary school maths teacher, and more recently I worked for a charity in Harlow called Streets2Homes, which supports homeless people, and for Action for Family Carers, which supports unpaid carers, particularly those who are young.”

He added: “In a recent school census, 72% of schools said that they did not have any young carers. I can tell members that, from my experience of supporting young carers, that cannot be correct.

“It is predicted that there are more than 10,000 young carers in Essex alone. Essex county council has identified roughly 3,700 of them, so there is a huge number of young carers whom we have not identified, let alone got the resource in place for.”

Before entering parliament, Vince was elected as a Labour councillor on Harlow District Council in 2018. He stood down as a councillor in 2024. He led the Labour group on the council from 2021 to 20124.

Vince previously stood unsuccessfully for parliament as the Labour candidate for Chelmsford at the 2015 and 2017 general elections, and Hertford and Stortford in 2019. He also contested the Essex police and crime commissioner elections in 2016 and 2021.

Vince featured on the Labour list for the East of England in the 2019 European Parliament election.

Political Views

Leadership elections

Labour deputy leadership 2025: Vince was one of 175 Labour MPs who nominated Bridget Phillipson 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.

Phillipson, the serving education secretary, was widely viewed as the candidate favoured by Downing Street and the party leadership. She secured 175 nominations from the Parliamentary Labour Party (PLP), comfortably exceeding the 80 required to reach the final ballot. She was ultimately defeated by Lucy Powell.

Factional identity and party tradition

Labour Movement for Europe: Vince was endorsed by the Labour Movement for Europe (LME) in the 2024 general election. Founded in 1981, LME is a pro-European socialist society affiliated with the Labour Party. It campaigns for a close relationship between the United Kingdom and the European Union. The organisation refers to itself as the “home of the pro-Europeans in the Labour and trade union movement”.

Brexit and Europe

Remain pledge: During the 2019 general election campaign, Vince was one of 193 Labour candidates to sign the anti-Brexit “Remain pledge”, drawn up by the campaign group Remain Labour.

It stated: “Labour is committed to a confirmatory referendum, to give you the final say on Brexit. If elected as your Labour MP, I pledge to campaign to Remain in the EU.”

Welfare

Welfare vote (July 2025): Vince voted in favour of the government’s flagship welfare 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

Vince voted in favour of the Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill, better known as the assisted dying bill, at second reading (November 2024) and third reading (June 2025).

Social values and conscience issues

Abortion decriminalisation (2025): Vince voted in favour of a backbench amendment to the Crime and Policing Bill that sought to decriminalise abortion in England and Wales in June 2025. The amendment, which was passed by a majority of 242 votes, removed women from the threat of prosecution for ending a pregnancy at any stage. As an issue of conscience, MPs were allowed to vote according to their personal beliefs.