John Martin Charles WrigleyHouse of Commons, Votes and Proceedings, Tuesday 9 July 2024. is a British Liberal Democrat politician who has been the Member of Parliament for Newton Abbot since 2024.
Wrigley was leader of Teignbridge District Council until July 2024.
Personal Life Martin Wrigley grew up in a naval family and as such lived around the world, including Halifax, Nova Scotia, and Tehran, where his father was the naval attaché before and during the revolution.
Martin Wrigley now lives in a village in the Newton Abbot constituency, and has done for a number of years. He has three children.
Professional Career Martin studied for a degree in Electrical and Electronics Engineering, and subsequently went to work for GEC Telecomms, writing software to design phone networks using traffic simulation. A career in various software houses followed, including the telecomms giant Orange (now EE) which included a secondment to silicon valley. During this time he was working on network management and control to database systems, all with a strong testing ethos.
Whilst at Orange Martin became the IT architect responsible for evolving the UK billing system to expand the support needed for millions of customers.
Martin subsequently became the director in a new global France Telecom/Orange team, building up external partners and app developers for Orange networks all over the world. He ran an industry app testing organisation working with other networks, phone manufacturers and system vendors.
In 2012 he started his own consultancy business and set up a UK branch of a US based app developer, which involved running conferences and lobbying EU and UK parliaments. He ran the continuation of the industry app testing standards organisation, was a non-executive director for the UK DfT Vehicle Certification Agency and worked with the DfE on the specifications for software design T-Levels.
Political Career In 2015 he was elected as a Councillor on Dawlish Town Council, Teignbridge District Council and Devon County Council. In the following years he served as Mayor of Dawlish and Leader of Teignbridge Council.
In July 2024 he was elected as Member of Parliament for Newton Abbot.
House of Commons Wrigley's parliamentary work has focused on technology policy, healthcare funding, transport infrastructure, digital regulation and public-sector procurement. He has secured or led parliamentary debates on GP funding in South West England, railway services in the South West, support for Ukrainians under the Ukraine Permission Extension Scheme, and Sustainable Drainage Systems (SuDS).
Wrigley introduced the Company Directors (Duties) Bill, a Private Member's Bill which sought to broaden the responsibilities of company directors by encouraging consideration of employees, communities and environmental impacts alongside shareholder interests.
The proposal formed part of wider debates around stakeholder governance, responsible capitalism and purpose-led business. The approach received support from organisations associated with the Better Business Act campaign, the B Corp movement and advocates of broader stakeholder models of corporate governance.
Campaign to remove Palantir from the NHS Federated Data Platform Wrigley has been one of the most prominent parliamentary critics of the NHS Federated Data Platform (FDP) and the role of Palantir Technologies within NHS digital infrastructure. Drawing on his background in software engineering and telecommunications, he has focused on issues including procurement, supplier dependency, competition, data governance, system ownership and long-term resilience.
His involvement has included serving on the Science, Innovation and Technology Committee during parliamentary scrutiny of public-sector technology procurement participating in evidence sessions involving Palantir and NHS officials , tabling parliamentary questions about the FDP contract and governance arrangements , and securing a Westminster Hall debate on the programme in April 2026.
Wrigley has also engaged with clinicians, technologists, academics and campaign groups examining NHS data policy and procurement and has made public interventions on issues including supplier lock-in, interoperability, technology sovereignty and long-term ownership of NHS digital infrastructure.
Throughout the debate, he has argued that NHS systems should remain replaceable, interoperable and under effective public control, with procurement arrangements designed to avoid dependency on a single supplier. He has advocated greater scrutiny of procurement processes, supplier lock-in risks, contract management and long-term ownership of critical digital infrastructure.
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