Vote Martin - a workers' MP to really speak for Chorley

07/04/2026

10/01/2025

On Tuesday, I led off the discussion at the first Lancashire Socialist Party meeting of 2025 with the following points ...
"With no prospect of sustained economic growth, the Starmer government will instead preside over further rounds of austerity and attacks on the working class.
Trump will accelerate the protectionist direction of US capitalism, lashing out at US ‘allies’ as well as China. Record levels of debt in the world economy remain, but now with higher interest rates making them harder to pay off. As a weaker power, and outside any of the major trading blocs, the Labour government will find that it will be a loser as the battles break out between the bigger global players.
This is the background against which Starmer’s Labour government set itself the goal of transforming Britain via economic growth. As a capitalist government, it won’t succeed! Britain’s economy, as the oldest capitalist power on the planet, is not at all well.
Britain’s national debt is currently 97.5% of GDP, the highest level since the early 1960s. This is a bit below the G7 average, but what makes a debt sustainable is not simply the absolute figures, but the willingness of the markets to ‘wear it’. Labour may yet face a future ‘Liz Truss’ moment at the hands of the money markets".... within days, these perspectives are becoming reality:

Chancellor could slash departmental spending in spring after ruling out tax increase, officials reveal

04/10/2024

My review in a nutshell: A book with some interesting reflections, largely based on English literature, but one that offers little to the urgent debate about how best to undercut the far-right. It lacks a socialist, class analysis - instead relying on a utopian vision of winning some kind of fairer capitalism. Read my review in full: https://socialismtoday.org/how-not-to-combat-right-wing-populism

17/09/2024

As 'Universities UK' calls for a rise in , & say: "If Starmer attacks students, we will fight back! Take the wealth off the super rich, scrap tuition fees and end student debt!"

Check out the Freshers special of the Socialist, with articles by Socialist Students on fighting cuts, racism & against the war on Gaza

07/07/2024

"In December 2019 the capitalist media immediately established the narrative – continued to this day – that Labour’s result under Jeremy Corbyn was ‘the worst since 1935’. In terms of seats won – 154 in 1935 and 202 in 2019 – the argument appeared irrefutable. The narrative now is that Starmer has achieved ‘the best ever’ result by his break with Corbynism’s policies and personnel.
Both narratives serve the same purpose. To try and undermine the idea, given promise by the possibilities that Corbyn’s period as Labour leader raised, that the working class could have its own party to represent it in its struggle with the interests of capitalism and that system’s political agents.
But both narratives are profoundly false. Factually, by making seat numbers the only metric; in assessing the balance of social forces revealed by the two elections – 2019 and today; and in understanding what July’s outcome will mean for the events ahead, including the struggle for a new, mass, workers’ party".

That the July 4th general election was an historic moment is now a commonplace in media commentary.  But what exactly is ‘historic’ about it is being consciously blurred. Now the Trade Unionist and Socialist Coalition (TUSC) is publishing a statistical review of the election – The 2024 Genera...

06/07/2024

Here's an article I've written summing-up our campaign in Chorley.
"We know that our 632 votes was a modest return for all of the hard work that we had put in. However, we are satisfied that we could not have done more to get our message across. No other party had been out at meetings, in the speaker-van, on the town centre stalls, on the doorsteps and on the council estates like we had. Our real reward was the TUSC team that we have built and grown over the campaign, a team that will be sticking together to campaign on all of the issues that we know the workers of Chorley feel so angry about - not least the cost-of-living crisis, the state of our crumbling NHS and public services, and the lack of genuinely affordable housing".

We're meeting up to review and discuss what we do next at the St. Joseph's Club, Harpers Lane, Chorley on Tuesday 9th July at 7pm - before the football for anyone who wants to watch it there afterwards - so you're welcome to come and join us there!

" Well Martin, what a strange election. We are all so proud of you standing up for us workers, and whilst [Lindsay Hoyle] got back in you sh...

02/07/2024

Another busy day of campaigning across the constituency - from Clayton Brook to Coppull - speaking to voters that nobody else is speaking to at all!