PEOPLE Before Profit launched their 2023 manifesto standing 15 candidates throughout the North in May's council elections – the largest amount ever fielded by the party.

The party's manifesto promises to end privatisation, stop rate hikes, make housing fairer and more democratic, protect LGBTQ+ rights and those of migrants as well as supporting the Irish language.

All 15 candidates were present as PBP MLA Gerry Carroll announced the party would be standing seven candidates in Belfast City Council.

The seven Belfast candidates are Cailín McCaffrey in Court, Fiona Doran in Orimiston, Fiona Ferguson in Oldpark, Matt Collins in Black Mountain, Michael Collins in Colin, Nick Cropper in Lisnasharragh and Sipho Sibanda in Botanic.

Also speaking at the event was PBP TD Richard Boyd Barrett.

Speaking on the party's record since they went from one councillor in Belfast to three in 2019, Oldpark councillor Fiona Ferguson said PBP would put forward alternative politics and criticised the DUP, Sinn Féin and Alliance for voting together in Belfast City Council to raise rates, drive privatisation and court property developers to the detriment of local people and services.

ELECTION: PBP and their 15 candidates for the upcoming council elections
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ELECTION: PBP and their 15 candidates for the upcoming council elections

Fiona Ferguson said: “Since being elected in 2019, our councillors have consistently fought for working class communities. We have refused to compromise with backward DUP politics or stand by while the other big parties implemented rates hikes.

“We are fighting for a radically different kind of politics than dead-end dysfunction and division. We want to see local councils organised for the needs of our workers and communities, not big corporations and developers.

“If re-elected, we will continue to use our Council platforms to raise the demands of striking nurses, teachers, council workers and more. So we are asking people to strike back at the ballot box with People Before Profit.”

Court candidate Cailín McCaffrey said PBP would promote a clear socialist message and offer an alternative to mainstream misery. Health waiting lists and the expansion and profits of private healthcare companies were cited as being at the top of PBP's concerns.

Ms McCaffrey said the DUP cared more about the flags on packets of sausages than the welfare of working class people who are being "crushed" by the cost of living crisis. She also said there were more dividing walls now between communities than there were in 1998 and sectarianism could only be truly battled on the picket line with workers uniting against those who seek to divide them.

Gerry Carroll added that one-third of the announced PBP candidates had recently been on strike themselves over the previous months.