Keir Hardie

Keir Hardie was born into poverty in Lanarkshire in 1856, worked as a delivery boy from about the age of seven and in coal mines from the age of ten. He taught himself to read and became a lay preacher and temperance campaigner. As secretary of the Ayrshire miners he led strikes over wages, was dismissed and blacklisted, and turned to journalism. He helped found the Scottish Labour Party in 1888 and was elected for West Ham South in 1892, arriving at Parliament in a cloth cap. He founded the Independent Labour Party in 1893, helped form the Labour Representation Committee in 1900 and represented Merthyr Tydfil from 1900 until his death in 1915. He led the Labour members in the Commons after the 1906 election, when the party won 29 seats, and stepped down as their chairman in 1908. He continued to live in Cumnock, Ayrshire, throughout his parliamentary career.

Labour supporters regard Hardie as the party's founding figure and a symbol of working-class representation in Parliament, and his bust stands outside Cumnock Town Hall. Contemporary critics, including many Liberals and Conservatives, saw his socialism and his opposition to war as unpatriotic, and some trade unionists of his day thought his militant approach to strikes counterproductive. Historians note that his influence came more from agitation and inspiration than from legislation. He remains one of the most cited figures in Labour Party history, and politicians from several parties have invoked his name.