He had been a factory worker as a child, and was largely self-educated, becoming a radical socialist. The 1889 London Dockers’ strike owed much of its success to his leadership. Burns was one of the first Labour representatives to be elected to Parliament (1892), but he fell out with Keir Hardie and turned his back on socialism. As a supporter of the Liberal Party he became President of the Local Government Board (1905–14) and introduced the first Town Planning Act (1909). He was President of the Board of Trade in 1914 but resigned from the cabinet in protest against Britain’s entry into World War I.