Tom Proctor (trade unionist)

{{Short description|British trade unionist and politician}}

{{Use dmy dates|date=April 2016}}

{{Other uses|Thomas Proctor (disambiguation){{!}}Thomas Proctor}}

{{Infobox person

|name=Tom Proctor

|birth_name=Thomas Proctor

|birth_date=1855

|birth_place=Nottingham, United Kingdom

|death_date=1925

|death_place=Plymouth, Devon, England

|occupation=Trade unionist, politician

|image=File:Tom Proctor - trade unionist.png

}}

Thomas Proctor (1855 – 1925Proctor's Death Certificate shows, died 5 Jul 1925, South Devon Hospital, Plymouth, Devon, England.) was a British trade unionist and Labour Party politician.

Born in Nottingham, Proctor left school at the age of twelve, and when he was fifteen, he travelled to France and joined Giuseppe Garibaldi's Army of the Vosges; fighting in the Franco-Prussian War. Although he was captured and taken prisoner, he was deported back to the United Kingdom on the grounds of his nationality and youth.Grimsby Labour Party History, "[http://www.grimsbylabour.com/his3.html Adoption of Labour's First Parliamentary Candidate] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150509191134/http://www.grimsbylabour.com/his3.html |date=9 May 2015 }}"

Proctor returned to Nottingham where he completed an apprenticeship in engineering, before travelling to Australia. He returned to Nottingham once more within a few years, and devoted much of his time to the Amalgamated Society of Engineers, becoming its chairman within a few years. He also joined the Social Democratic Federation.Mary Hilson, Political Change and the Rise of Labour in Comparative Perspective, p.109

In 1890, Proctor moved to Plymouth to work in the Devonport Dockyard. He had an immediate impact on local labour organisation, founding a trades council in 1892. Despite early disagreements over whether to support Liberal-Labour candidates or only independent labour ones, it gradually grew in strength and hosted the national Trades Union Congress (TUC) in 1899.

Proctor had joined the Independent Labour Party (ILP) in the 1890s, and hosting the TUC enabled him to propose a special congress, early the following year, to discuss founding a new political party, independent of the Liberal Party, to contest local and national elections. This proposal gained support and, although Proctor had limited further involvement, the congress went ahead and founded the Labour Representation Committee (LRC).Logie Barrow and Ian Bullock, Democratic Ideas and the British Labour Movement, 1880–1914, p.128

In 1903, Proctor was adopted as the LRC candidate for the 1906 general election in Great Grimsby. Although he had no connection with the area, and remained resident in Plymouth, Proctor visited Grimsby frequently for a week at a time to campaign and give speeches, gradually attracting larger crowds to hear him.Grimsby Labour Party History, "[http://www.grimsbylabour.com/his44.html Early Labour History – Election Campaign 1] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150509191139/http://www.grimsbylabour.com/his44.html |date=9 May 2015 }}" However, he ultimately finished in third place at the election, with 2,248 votes.Grimsby Labour Party History, "[http://www.grimsbylabour.com/his7.html Up to the 1906 Election] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150509191155/http://www.grimsbylabour.com/his7.html |date=9 May 2015 }}"

Proctor did not stand for Parliament again until the 1918 general election, when he was selected for Nottingham East by the renamed Labour Party, with the support of the ILP. He finished in second place there, with 2,817 votes.Report of the Twenty-second Annual Conference of the Labour Party, p.48 He also stood for election in Camborne at the 1922 general election, where he finished in third place with 4,512 votes. Proctor was never elected as an MP, nor did he ever contest another general election in his lifetime again.