Every day, we’re hearing more bad news about jobs and more people are  struggling to make ends meet.  Cheltenham has a healthy local economy but local firms and families are still feeling the heat.  Unemployment here is now more than 5% - modest but rising and higher now than it has been since the very high unemployment of the 1980s.

Top engineering firms like Messier Dowty are well placed to weather the storm

Martin has been actively contacting local businesses, listening to their concerns and offering to help wherever he can.  Having worked in local business before he was elected, Martin decided to go back to his old desk for a day at the marketing agency now called Tangible Response.

Back at his old desk Martin worked for a local business before being elected

In Parliament, he has been working with colleagues Nick Clegg and Vince Cable to press for urgent action on the economy:

• Big income tax cuts for those on low and middle incomes.  This will do much more than tinkering with VAT to revive economic activity.
• More help for homeowners facing repossession.
• More help with high fuel bills for pensioners and others at risk
• Banks giving businesses the credit they need to keep trading.  Despite all the public money they’ve been given, bank lending is getting even tighter.

Martin discusses economic plans with Vince Cable MP

The government ignored the housing bubble that caused so many of our current problems – here it squeezed families out of the housing market and sent developers racing for the countryside.  Now the bubble’s burst, the government is bungling the resulting crisis. The small cut in VAT just wasted £12.5 billion of public money.  Tory tax plans seem to be aimed mainly at the wealthy few.

Locally, Martin is determined to champion local jobs and local business and has been talking up Cheltenham’s chances of beating the recession. He has argued for a better deal for successful mutual building societies like Chelsea, promoted Cheltenham’s Festivals in Parliament with an eye to drawing even more valuable visitors to the town and encouraged council backing for areas like the Lower High Street that deserve more support.

Cheltenham’s five green stars
Martin has found a whole series of smaller Cheltenham companies that are expanding into environmentally-friendly business even in the teeth of recession.  Cheltenham’s green stars include Brightsource (www.brightsource.co.uk), a fast-growing innovative print management company based in Cheltenham that is pioneering ‘carbon footprinting’ and sourcing of environmentally-friendly print so that clients really understand the impact they’re having on the environment. Think Lighting (www.think-lighting.co.uk) produce low energy lighting, including bright and beautiful replacements for the halogen light fittings that are trendy but waste both energy and money.  Architects Heath Avery (www.heath-avery.co.uk) specialise in sustainable homes and buildings including a revolutionary eco home featured on TV’s Grand Designs. Plexus Technology (www.plexus-technology.com) have a radical new take on energy efficiency offering computerised systems that manage energy use and can halve a client’s energy bill. Commercial Group (www.commercial.co.uk) is an office supplies company that have already won awards for drastically reducing their carbon footprint and putting sustainability at the heart of their business.

Martin believes in Cheltenham’s future success and is working flat out to protect local jobs.