Martin John Ferguson AM (born 12 December 1953) is an Australian former Labor Party politician who was the Member of the House of Representatives for Batman from 1996 to 2013.

[1] As FMWU General Secretary, and from 1985 to 1990 as Vice President of the ACTU, Ferguson worked closely alongside the likes of Bill Kelty and Simon Crean to negotiate with the Hawke-Keating government the Prices and Incomes Accord.

The other candidates, Jenny Mikakos and Theo Theophanous, then members of competing Left factions, were forced to withdraw from a local preselection plebiscite in favour of Ferguson, as a result of these negotiations.

He continued in both roles after Julia Gillard succeeded Rudd as Prime Minister in June 2010, and resigned from both in March 2013, ahead of his retirement from Parliament that August.

He also supported – in scientific terms – the proposal of former Prime Minister Bob Hawke for Australia to become the world's storage facility for nuclear waste although he said that it was politically not possible.

[7] He told ABC Radio that it was wrong to ban uranium exports to the People's Republic of China: "The Labor Party adopts the view that we're open for investment.

Ferguson even went further, saying he was "ashamed of the Party" and accusing Foley and the unions of "deliberately misleading the public, creating unnecessary fear and trying to scare people".