Martin Turner is the Liberal Democrat Parliamentary Candidate for Stratford-on-Avon.
Stratford-on-Avon is the Westernmost and Southernmost constituency in Warwickshire, going from Earlswood in the north to Little Compton in the south, and from Middle Tysoe in the east to Salford Priors and Iron Cross in the west. Map courtesy Ordnance Survey
He is currently Director of Communications for NHS Warwickshire, and was previously Executive Officer at West Midlands Arts (now Arts Council West Midlands) and European Communications Manager at Lucas Automotive (now TRW).
Martin’s connection with Stratford goes back to the 1990s, when he was involved in the arts lottery award for Studley Village Hall and opened Stratford’s cinema alongside Stratford’s Mayor, representing West Midlands Arts which had brokered the funding. He was selected as parliamentary candidate in 2007.
He lives in Marlcliff, just over the river from Bidford on Avon, with his wife Marjolein, who runs a translation business.
Born in the Yorkshire moorland on 2 April 1966, when ‘the only thing the doctor did when he arrived was to dig the midwife’s car out of a snow drift’, Martin spent most of his childhood summers on his great-uncle’s farm in Staithes, North Yorkshire. The family moved to Birmingham while it was still part of Warwickshire in 1971. He was awarded a choral scholarship to Tewkesbury Abbey at the age of nine, but instead opted to attend St Chad’s Cathedral School, Lichfield. He subsequently gained a place at King Edward’s School, Birmingham, from which he took a scholarship to Hertford College, University of Oxford, reading English Language and Literature, specialising in Anglo-Saxon, archaeology, linguistics and Icelandic.
After Oxford, Martin worked for international Christian youth charity Operation Mobilisation (OM) in Belgium (1988-1996). He has continued his association with OM, and has subsequently also worked with World Vision in Armenia, making a video documentary reporting on the progress of re-development in the 20 years since the 1988 earthquake.
Martin is a member of Bidford on Avon Baptist church. A former chair of the Liberal Democrat Christian Forum, he was one of the three founders of Christians in Politics, which brought together the Christians of the three main political parties.
Martin is currently chair of the Liberal Democrat Parliamentary Candidates Association.
A member of British Fencing, Martin recently stepped down as West Midlands Fencing Captain, delivering the region’s best ever result in 2009. He is chairman of Warwickshire Fencing, and has fenced for the county since 2005. Currently not fencing in the run up to the General Election, his best UK ranking was 39th, during the 2007-2008 season.
In 2009, he became one of the first 25 Chartered Practitioners at the Chartered Institute of Public Relations
Copyright 2007 martinturner.org.uk
