About Claude Moraes

Claude Moraes MEP

Claude Moraes MEP is Deputy Leader of the European Parliamentary Labour Party (EPLP).

First elected to the European Parliament in 1999, Claude was London's first ethnic minority Member of the European Parliament (MEP) and one of the first Asian MEPs elected to the Parliament overall. Claude was re-elected as an MEP for London in 2004.

In June 2009, Claude was number one on the London list of Labour candidates in the European Parliamentary elections, being re-elected to the European Parliament for the third time.

Shortly after this, Claude was elected a Spokesperson for the Socialists and Democrats in the European Parliament.

This senior position in the European Parliament means Claude is the main Socialist MEP representing the 495 million citizens of the European Union on Civil Liberties, Justice and Home Affairs.

In the European Parliament, Claude is also Labour spokesperson on Justice and Home Affairs, Substitute Member of the Internal Market Committee, Vice-President of the Delegation for relations with the Arab Peninsula, Vice President of Anti-Racism & Diversity Intergroup and Co-President of the Intergroup on Ageing.

Claude was previously Director of JCWI, the national migration and refugee charity and Chief Executive of the Immigrants' Aid Trust. Before that, he was a national officer at the TUC, a representative to the European TUC in Brussels, House of Commons adviser to MPs John Reid and Paul Boateng and a CRE Commissioner.

With a legal background, he has campaigned and written widely on human rights and migration issues including co-authoring the 'Politics of Migration' (Blackwells, 2003).