Belfast Labour Party

The Belfast Labour Party was a political party in Belfast, Ireland from 1892 until 1924.

The first socialist party in Ireland, it was founded in 1892 and affiliated with the British Labour Representation Committee in 1900 and remained attached to the Labour Party in Britain.

Labour ran the Unionist party close in Belfast North in a by-election in 1905 and in the general election of 1906. [ [http://www.ark.ac.uk/elections/h1885.htm Westminster Elections in the future Northern Ireland, 1885-1910 by Nicholas Whyte] ] [ [http://www.ulster-scots.co.uk/docs/articles/historical/ulsterlabourpolitics1885-1906.htm Sectarian Divisions of Ulster Labor Politics 1885-1906 by Wade Shen] ]

In 1913 the Labour NEC agreed that the Irish Labour Party would have organising rights over the entirety of Ireland. The Belfast Labour Party disagreed with this, and faced with the British party's refusal to reconsider, formed the independent Belfast Labour Representation Committee, which declared itself a party in 1917.

The party won ten seats on Belfast City Council in 1919, but soon lost these. Suffragette, "Independent Labour" and Co-operative activist Margaret McCoubrey in 1920 was elected a Labour councillor for Dock ward in Belfast. [ [http://www.ulsterbiography.co.uk/biogsMac1.htm McCoubrey, Margaret 1880-1955 Dictionary of Ulster Biography] ] Nonetheless, they came a very close second in Belfast West in the 1923 UK general election before forming with others the Northern Ireland Labour Party.

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