It would be difficult to mention the name of a great statesman who laid the foundations of his fame in rural local government.
As in local government, so in the Imperial Parliament.

Rural England sends no Labour member to the House of Commons.

Only in very exceptional cases has a tenant farmer been elected.

It is the social labour of the mine and the mill that has produced the Labour member of Parliament.
Mr.Joseph Arch made a valiant attempt to organise the agricultural labourers of England, and from 1880 to 1890 a rural labourers' union, with some thousands of members, was in existence.

For a time this secured a rise in wages, and when Mr.Arch was in Parliament, as a Liberal M.P.
(1885-1895), the rural labourer hoped for lasting improvement in the conditions of life.