Charles Dukes, 1st Baron Dukeston

British trade unionist and Labour Party politician For the American astronaut, see Charles Duke.

Charles Dukes, 1st Baron Dukeston CBE (28 October 1881 – 14 May 1948) was a British trade unionist and Labour Party politician.

Born in Stourbridge, Dukes left school at the age of eleven, taking up work as an errand boy. When his family moved to Warrington, he joined working in a forge. He subsequently had a number of casual jobs throughout north west England, including working on the Manchester Ship Canal.

In 1909 his career as a trade union official began when he was elected secretary of the Warrington branch of the National Union of Gasworkers. He was a founding member of the British Socialist Party, and was elected to the party's national executive in 1914. During the First World War he was a conscientious objector, serving some time in prison. He became a district secretary in what had become the National Union of General Workers. From 1934 to 1946, Dukes was General Secretary of the National Union of General and Municipal Workers. From 1946 to 1947 he was President of the Trades Union Congress. In 1947 he was appointed a director of the Bank of England.

Although Charles Dukes had no biological children, he mentored two of his sister Annie's children, Jack and Reginald Cooper, and raised them in what is now known as the GMB Union.

Jack Cooper later followed in his Uncle's footsteps and became a Labour MP and also a General Secretary of the GMB Union (Jack Cooper, Baron Cooper of Stockton Heath)

Parliamentary career

At the 1923 general election, Dukes was elected as the Member of Parliament (MP) for Warrington in Lancashire, narrowly defeating the sitting Conservative MP Alec Cunningham-Reid. When the First Labour Government fell in 1924, Dukes lost his seat in the resulting 1924 general election, unseated by his predecessor Cunningham-Reid.

However, at the 1929 general election, when Cunningham-Reid abandoned Warrington and stood unsuccessfully in Southampton, Dukes was returned again to the House of Commons. When Labour split in 1931 over the handling of budgetary response to the Great Depression, Dukes was defeated in the subsequent general election, and did not stand for election to the House of Commons again.

In 1942 he was made a Commander of the Order of the British Empire and in 1946 was appointed an adviser to the Paris Peace Conference.

Charles Dukes served as the British representative on the United Nations Commission on Human Rights in 1947 and was one of the nine individuals who drafted the Universal Declaration on Human Rights.

He was ennobled in 1947 as Baron Dukeston, of Warrington in the County Palatine of Lancaster, and was an active Labour Party peer. He died the following year in a London hospital, aged 66, without an heir, and the title became extinct. He was buried in Chesham Bois, Buckinghamshire, close to his home in Amersham.

References

"Historical list of MPs: House of Commons constituencies beginning with "W" (part 1)". Leigh Rayment's House of Commons pages. Archived from the original on 13 June 2018. Retrieved 21 November 2009.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: unfit URL (link)
^ "Obituary: Lord Dukeston. A Former President Of The T.U.C.". The Times. 15 May 1948. p. 6.
^ "DUKESTON, 1st Baron". Who Was Who. Oxford University Press. Retrieved 26 December 2013.
^ Craig, F. W. S. (1983) . British parliamentary election results 1918–1949 (3rd ed.). Chichester: Parliamentary Research Services. p. 267. ISBN 0-900178-06-X.
Craig, op. cit, page 243
"No. 37921". The London Gazette. 1 April 1947. p. 1497.
"Court Circular". The Times. 20 May 1948. p. 6.

External links

Hansard 1803–2005: contributions in Parliament by Charles Dukes

Parliament of the United Kingdom
Preceded byAlec Cunningham-Reid	Member of Parliament for Warrington 1923 – 1924	Succeeded byAlec Cunningham-Reid
Preceded byAlec Cunningham-Reid	Member of Parliament for Warrington 1929 – 1931	Succeeded byNoel Goldie
Trade union offices
Preceded byWalter Wood	Leeds District Secretary of the National Union of General and Municipal Workers 1924–1925	Succeeded byJ. D. S. Highman
Preceded byFleming Eccles	Lancashire District Secretary of the National Union of General and Municipal Workers 1925–1934	Succeeded byArthur Seabury
Preceded byJohn Beard and Frank Wolstencroft	Trades Union Congress representative to the American Federation of Labour 1932 With: Bill Holmes	Succeeded byJoe Hall and Jimmy Rowan
Preceded byPeter Tevenan	President of the International Federation of Employees in Public Services 1932–1937	Succeeded byMark Hewitson
Preceded byWill Thorne	General Secretary of the National Union of General and Municipal Workers 1934–1946	Succeeded byTom Williamson
Preceded byGeorge Hicks	Chairman of the Trades Councils' Joint Consultative Committee 1937 – 1938	Succeeded byJohn Marchbank
Preceded byEbby Edwards	President of the Trades Union Congress 1946–1947	Succeeded byGeorge Walker Thomson
Peerage of the United Kingdom
New creation	Baron Dukeston 1947–1948	Extinct

v t e GMB
General Secretaries	1924: Will Thorne 1934: Charles Dukes 1946: Tom Williamson 1962: Jack Cooper 1973: David Basnett 1986: John Edmonds 2003: Kevin Curran 2005: Paul Kenny 2016: Tim Roache 2021: Gary Smith
Deputy and Assistant General Secretaries	1924: Peter Tevenan and Ralph Spence 1933: Ralph Spence 1935: Abolished 1991: Tom Burlison 1996: Steve Pickering 2003: Debbie Coulter 2008: Vacant
Presidents	1924: J. R. Clynes 1938: Fred Marshall 1946: T. W. Kerry 1949: William E. Hopkin 1952: Jack Cooper 1962: Bernard Swindell 1964: Charles Smith 1970: Alex M. Donnet 1976: Derek Gladwin 1982: Dick Pickering 1987: James Morrell 1988: Olga Mean 1992: Dick Pickering 1996: Mary Turner 2018: Barbara Plant
Forerunners	Municipal Employees' Association National Amalgamated Union of Labour National Union of General Workers
Other topics	Uber BV v Aslam GMB National College

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