Sir Ian McCartney (born 25 April 1951) is a British Labour Party politician who served as Member of Parliament (MP) for Makerfield from 1987 to 2010.

[1] He was born in Lennoxtown, Stirlingshire,[2] to future Labour MP for East Dunbartonshire Hugh McCartney and his wife, Margaret, a trade unionist.

[9] He held a number of positions during Labour's period in opposition, and was variously a spokesman on Health, Employment, Education and Social Services.

[11][12][13] McCartney was made Minister of State for Competitiveness at the Department of Trade and Industry (DTI) following the 1997 general election when Labour came to power.

[7] As a former low-paid worker who had been sacked upon asking for a pound pay rise after having a child, McCartney later described the minimum wage as very important to him, saying that he would have "died in the ditch" for it.

During this year his drug addict son Hugh McCartney died of a heroin overdose in a Glasgow tenement block.

In 2006 he took a three-month leave of absence following heart bypass surgery,[15] and publicly told of his fight to lose weight for the sake of his health.

After details of this position were published in The Independent, McCartney stated unequivocally that he personally received none of the remuneration for this role, instead using part of the fee to employ someone in the House of Commons from his Makerfield constituency.

[23] He was married firstly to Jean (née Murray), with whom he had son Hugh and daughters Yvonne and Karen, later divorcing.