Luke Taylor is the Liberal Democrat MP for Sutton and Cheam, having first been elected to parliament at the 2024 general election.

In the 2024 general election, Taylor won 17,576 votes, representing 36.9% of the vote. The Conservative candidate, Tom Drummond, received 13,775 votes (28.9%), while the Labour candidate, Chrishni Reshekaron, secured 8,430 votes (17.7%). Taylor was duly elected with a majority of 3,801.

The Sutton and Cheam constituency was held by Paul Scully of the Conservative Party from 2015 to 2024, and before that by the Liberal Democrats from 1997 to 2015.

Political Career

Taylor currently serves on the Liberal Democrat frontbench as London spokesperson. He was appointed to this role in September 2024.

In April 2025, Taylor led a Westminster Hall debate on government support for Thames Water. He accused the company of having “unleashed filth in our waterways and homes, while cutting deeper and deeper into our personal finances.”

Taylor added: “When I think about the performance of Thames Water, I imagine the very excrement it fails to manage. Despite all the years of historic under-investment in favour of profit, the business has been run into the ground.

“It now finds itself on the brink of collapse, counting down its days of cash remaining, as we all saw in the recent documentary.”

In October 2024, Taylor introduced the Hospices and Health Care (Report on Funding) Bill as a private member’s bill (PMB). The proposed legislation called for a government report to be presented to parliament “on the potential merits of including pharmacy, pathology, patient community equipment, palliative consultant costs, clinical nurse specialist services, and advance care planning costs within the NHS funding framework.”

Taylor is a member of the House of Commons public administration and constitutional affairs committee (since October 2024). Pacac examines how the country is run, covering both the machinery of government and the UK’s constitutional rules. It is the principal select committee to which Cabinet Office ministers are accountable.

Taylor is listed as a member of the all-party parliamentary groups (APPGs) for the Ahmadiyya Muslim community, aviation, travel and aerospace (chair), British Hindus and urinary tract infections.

Taylor delivered his maiden speech on 8 October 2024 during a debate on farming and food security.

In it, he said: “I am so grateful to the thousands of residents who put their trust in me just a few months ago. I promise them: I will always do my very best for you and our communities, from Sutton to Worcester Park, Cheam to Belmont and everywhere in between.

“I hope I am already going some way to repaying the trust they have put in me by voting to end the two-child benefit cap, voting to save the winter fuel payment, and already helping hundreds of them with issues and concerns through my office.”

He added: “In today’s Britain, the social contract has been broken. In our politics, cynicism and self-interest have replaced service and duty, and many feel that it is simply no longer true that if they work hard and play by the rules, they will enjoy the security and opportunity that everyone deserves.

“A fair deal no longer exists between the British state and the people, and that is evident across every policy area. As an engineer, I feel confident in saying that the very foundations of our country are broken. It is time that we picked up our tools to fix them.”

Before entering parliament, Taylor was elected as a Liberal Democrat councillor on Sutton London Borough Council in May 2022. He stood down as a councillor in 2026.

Taylor previously stood as the Liberal Democrat candidate for Mitcham and Morden in the 2019 general election and for Battersea at the 2015 election.

Political Views

The Liberal Democrats (or Lib Dems) are a liberal political party, occupying the centre to centre-left ground in British politics.

The preamble to the Lib Dem constitution begins: “The Liberal Democrats exist to build and safeguard a fair, free and open society, in which we seek to balance the fundamental values of liberty, equality and community, and in which no-one shall be enslaved by poverty, ignorance or conformity.”

The Liberal Democrat autumn conference in 2021 ratified a policy paper entitled What Liberal Democrats Believe. The paper, an attempt to expand on the constitution’s preamble, was framed around seven “principles and values”.

The party’s core values were described as “liberty, equality, democracy, community, internationalism and environmentalism.”

Taylor is listed as a supporter of the all-party parliamentary group (APPG) for fair elections – a cross-party group of MPs and peers that campaigns for electoral reform. The group’s stated aims include replacing the first past the post (FPTP) voting system with a form of proportional representation, eliminating “dark money” and “undemocratic influence” from politics, and countering disinformation.

In December 2024, Taylor voted in favour of the Elections (Proportional Representation) Bill – introduced by Liberal Democrat frontbencher Sarah Olney under the 10-minute rule procedure. The bill sought to “introduce a system of proportional representation for parliamentary elections and for local government elections in England”.

A total of 138 MPs supported the bill – with 136 opposed. Notably, 59 Labour MPs backed Olney’s bill.

Introducing the bill, Olney told the House: “First past the post is a broken and unfair system. This summer, the Labour party won a landslide election victory, securing 63% of seats in the House of Commons in return for just 34% of the vote.

“The system leaves millions of voices unheard and creates a divisive, adversarial political climate where collaboration is discouraged and accountability is often sidestepped.”

Brexit and Europe

Customs union vote (2025): In December 2025, Taylor 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.

Assisted dying

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

Social values and conscience issues

Taylor was one of the 38 Liberal Democrat MPs who voted for the Tobacco and Vapes Act 2026 at its House of Commons third reading.

Abortion decriminalisation (2025): Taylor supported 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.

Foreign policy and security

IPAC: Taylor 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.”

Before Politics

Luke Alexander Taylor grew up in rural Lincolnshire. He attended De Aston School in Market Rasen.

Taylor studied engineering at Imperial College London, graduating in 2004.

Taylor’s career before entering frontline politics centred on engineering and public affairs roles.

Personal Life

Taylor lives in Sutton. He is married and has two sons.

His father, Neil Taylor, was a Liberal Democrat councillor.

Trivia

His father stood as the Liberal Democrat candidate for Gainsborough and Horncastle in the 1992 general election, for Gainsborough in the 1997 election and for Bassetlaw in 2001.