James Keir Hardie MP (1856 – 1915) The first Labour MP for West Ham South. Early Life. 

James Keir Hardie was born in Scotland on 15th August, 1856, the son of Mary Keir.

The Hardie family was poor and James had to find work as soon as possible. At the age of eight he became a bakers’ delivery boy, working for twelve-and-a-half hours a day and earning 3s 6d (17½p) a week. He became a coal miner at the age of eleven.

James never went to school and was completely illiterate until his mother began teaching him. Despite working twelve hours a day in the mine, he continued to study and had learned to write by the age of 17.

 Political and Union Interests 

Hardie’s main political concerns were the improvement of working conditions and equality. He read in newspapers about how some workers were attempting to improve their wages and working conditions by forming trade unions. He helped to set up a union in the mine in Lanarkshire where he worked. He was fired from his job because of this.

In 1881 he worked as a journalist for a local newspaper and also held several positions in Scottish unions and began a newspaper called The Miner (later renamed the Labour Leader). Hardie used the paper to give miners a political education.

Although he was raised as an atheist, Hardie converted to Christianity in 1897 and became a lay preacher for the Evangelical Union Church. He was also active in the Temperance Society. The dominant influence on his political ideas was his religious beliefs.

Hardie became disillusioned with the Liberal government of William Gladstone and came to the conclusion that working-class people need their own political party, so began advocating socialism.

In 1888 Hardie stood as the Independent Labour candidate for the constituency of Mid-Lanarkshire, but failed to get elected.

In 1889 he attended the second Workers’ International in Paris and in 1891 took part in the Miners’ International in Belgium.

Enters Parliament for West Ham South 

In the1892 General Election, Hardie stood as the Independent Labour candidate for the West Ham South constituency. Winning the election he became this country’s first socialist MP. In 1895 he lost the set to Major Banes, the Tory candidate whom he had beaten three years earlier.

In those days it was the tradition for MPs to wear top hats. Hardie created a sensation by entering Parliament wearing a cloth cap and tweed suit!  

In the House of Commons, Hardie argued that people earning more than £1,000 a year (a lot of money in those days), should pay a higher rate of income tax, saying that this extra revenue  should be used to provide old age pensions and free schooling for working class people. Hardie also campaigned for the reform of Parliament, including abolition of the House of Lords, and for the payment of MPs. He was a supporter of the women’s suffrage movement (striving to get the vote for women).

In 1893 Hardie helped to set up a new socialist group called the Independent Labour Party (ILP) and was elected chairman at its opening conference.

In 1894 Hardie suggested to the Commons that a message of condolence be to the relatives of 251 coal miners killed in an explosion in a colliery in Wales ,should be added to an address of congratulations on the birth of a royal heir (the future king Edward VIII). When his request was refused, Hardie made a speech attacking the privileges of the Monarchy. This created uproar in the Commons and he was attacked in the newspapers of that time.

After losing his parliamentary seat in 1895, he devoted most of his time to improving the organisation of the ILP.

 Later political career 

In 1896 Emmeline Pankhurst, an ILP member in Manchester, began organising Sunday open-air meetings in local parks. These were declared illegal by the local authority and speakers began to be arrested and sent to prison. She invited Hardie to speak at a meeting held in July, 1896, when over 50,000 attended. Soon after starting to speak, Hardie was arrested. The Home Secretary was worried about the publicity that Hardie was getting, so used his powers to have him released.

For a long time Hardie believed that the trade unions and socialist groups should join forces and form one large political party. In 1900 a meeting took place in London that resulted in the formation of the Labour Representation Committee. This developed into the Labour Party.

Hardie spent many years trying to build up the Labour Party, eventually becoming leader of the Parliamentary Labour Party. In the 1900 general Election he was elected at MP for Merthyr Tydfil in south Wales and was one of only two Labour MPs in the House of Commons. In the 1906 election Labour won 29 seats and in the 1910 election 40 Labour MPs were elected.

Committed to international socialism, Hardie toured the world arguing for equality. Speeches he made in favour of self-rule in India and equal rights for non-whites in South Africa resulted in riots and again he was attacked in newspapers as being a trouble maker. He lost friend in the Labour Party over his support for women’s right to vote.

The First World War began in 1914 and Hardie, a pacifist, disagreed with Labour Party colleagues about it. He tried to organise a national strike against Britain’s participation in the war. Despite being seriously ill, Hardie took part on several anti-war demonstrations and was denounced by some of his former colleagues as a traitor.

James Keir Hardie died on 25th September, 1915.

The Keir Hardie housing estate in Canning Town was named after him