Laura Sandys

The Honourable Laura Sandys
Sandys (left) in 2013
Member of Parliament for South Thanet
In office 6 May 2010 – 30 March 2015
Preceded by	Stephen Ladyman
Succeeded by	Craig Mackinlay
Personal details
Born	(1964-06-05) 5 June 1964 (age 52)
Nationality	British
Political party	Conservative
Spouse(s)	Randolph Kent
Religion	Church of England

Laura Jane Sandys (/ˈsændz/; born 5 June 1964) is chair of the European Movement UK and a British Conservative Party politician. She served as the Member of Parliament (MP) for South Thanet between the 2010 UK general election and 2015.

Sandys stood down at the general election in 2015.

The daughter of Duncan Sandys through his second marriage to Marie-Claire (née Schmitt), Sandys was born on 5 June 1964 and christened on 17 July 1964 in the Crypt Chapel of the Palace of Westminster. Her father was a member of parliament, and later a life peer, who served as Minister of Defence in Harold Macmillan's government and was also the son-in-law of Winston Churchill (through his first marriage to Diana Churchill).

In the 1980s, Sandys was a Director of Barter Group, an organisation doing business by exchange of goods or services rather than cash in the former Eastern Bloc. She moved on to lead the Parliamentary Unit at the Consumers' Association. Sandys has also worked in public relations; since 1992 she worked through Laura Sandys Associates, also known by its abbreviation LSA. She later became Head of Communications at the Shopping Hours Reform Council, an organisation which promotes allowing shops to open on Sundays. She is also a journalist, also writing for newspapers, and a commentator appearing on television and radio on a wide range of issues, including urban development and the Iraq war. She contributed the opening chapter Paul Cornish's book The War in Iraq (October 2004).