John Burns (1858-1943)
Rt. Hon. John Elliott Burns (1858–1943), labour leader and politician
1858 Born son of Alexander Burns in South Lambeth
His indentures were cancelled twice by irate employers due to his insubordination before he finally completed his apprenticeship at Mowlems, a major London contractor. There he came under the influence of Victor Delahaye, an exiled former communard and member of a French Marxist group, committed to the view that in the absence of effective physical force and organization, the working class could throw off capitalism only through the ballot box.
Worked for the Niger Company in west Africa.
1881 returned to England and settled in Battersea, London.
1882 he married (Martha) Charlotte Gale (1861–1936), daughter of a Battersea shipwright. They had one son, Edgar (b. 1895).
Burns threw himself energetically into the radical movement.
1889 Burns's popularity and record as a Labour militant enabled him to win one of the two Battersea seats on the newly established London County Council.
1890 After strongly supporting the dock strike, he was elected to the parliamentary committee of the TUC.
1892 he was elected as MP for Battersea
1907 Gave up his seat on the LCC.
Burns supported free-trade so, when the Unionist Joseph Chamberlain launched his tariff reform campaign in 1903, the Liberal leaders appreciated the political advantage of having on their platforms a genuine working man who was not afraid to attack Chamberlain as a 'fiscal pervert'.
1905 The new Liberal prime minister, Henry Campbell-Bannerman, offered Burns the presidency of the Local Government Board, the first working man to achieve cabinet rank.
1909 During a lacklustre period at the Board, the one significant piece of legislation that he did oversee was the Housing and Town Planning Act of 1909.
1914 Moved by Asquith to the Board of Trade but resigned on the outbreak of war.
1918 Left Parliament
1943 Died at Wandsworth.
1943 Obituary [1]
The Right Hon. JOHN BURNS, P.C., was born in London on 20 October 1858 and died in a London hospital on 24 January 1943.
On leaving school he served an apprenticeship in the engineering works of Mr. Thomas Horner, engineer and millwright, of Millbank, Westminster; under his father, Alexander Burns, of Ayrshire, who at one time was Chief Engineer on boats plying between Holyhead and Kingstown.
He devoted himself to the improvement of the conditions of the working classes and in 1889 he took a leading part in the dock strike, and particularly in the organization of relief among the strikers and their families. In the same year he was elected to the first London County Council, being the only working class member, and his fellow engineers raised a maintenance fund so that he could devote himself to local government work. The "fair wages" clause, which became general in local government contracts, was drafted by him.
In 1892 he was elected Labour Member of Parliament for Battersea.
In 1905 he attained Cabinet rank as President of the Local Government Board and retained that office until 1914, when he was transferred to the Board of Trade. On the outbreak of war in 1914 he resigned his office and retired into private life, although he retained his seat in Parliament until the General Election in 1918.
Mr. Burns was elected an Honorary Member of The Institution on 1 December 1914.
In 1881 he married Miss Charlotte Gale, and had one son, who died in France in 1922 as the result of war service. Mrs. Burns died in 1936.
See Also
Sources of Information
- Biography of John Elliott Burns, ODNB