Joseph Chamberlain - Early Political Career - Mayor of Birmingham

Mayor of Birmingham

In November 1873 the Liberal Party swept the municipal elections and Chamberlain was elected mayor of Birmingham. The Conservatives had denounced his Radicalism and called him a 'monopoliser and a dictator' whilst the Liberals had campaigned against their High Church Tory opponents with the slogan 'The People above the Priests'. As mayor, Chamberlain promoted many civic improvements, leaving the town (in words to Collings) 'parked, paved, assized, marketed, gas & watered and improved'. Prior to his tenure in office, the city's municipal administration was notably lax with regards to public works, and many urban dwellers lived in conditions of great poverty.

The Birmingham Gas Company and the Birmingham and Staffordshire Gas Company were locked in constant competition, in which the city's streets were continually dug up to lay mains. Chamberlain forcibly purchased the two companies on behalf of the borough for £1,953,050, even offering to purchase the companies himself if the ratepayers refused. In its first year of operations the new municipal gas scheme made a profit of £34,000.

The city's water supply was considered a danger to public health – approximately half of the city's population was dependent on well water, much of which was polluted by sewage. Piped water was only supplied three days per week, compelling the use of well water and water carts for the rest of the week. Deploring the rising death rate from contagious diseases in the poorest parts of the city, in January 1876, Chamberlain forcibly purchased Birmingham's waterworks for a combined sum of £1,350,000, creating Birmingham Corporation Water Department, having declared to a House of Commons Committee that 'We have not the slightest intention of making profit...We shall get our profit indirectly in the comfort of the town and in the health of the inhabitants'. Despite this noticeable executive action, Chamberlain was mistrustful of central authority and bureaucracy, preferring to give local communities the responsibility to act on their own initiative.

In July 1875 Chamberlain tabled an improvement plan involving slum clearance in Birmingham's city centre. Chamberlain had been consulted by the Home Secretary, Richard Assheton Cross during the preparation of the Artisan's and Labourers' Dwellings Improvement Act 1875, during Disraeli's social improvement programme. Chamberlain bought 50 acres (200,000 m²) of property to build a new road, (Corporation Street), through Birmingham's overcrowded slums. Overriding the protests of local landlords and the Commissioner of the Local Government Board's inquiry into the scheme, Chamberlain gained the endorsement of the President of the Local Government Board, George Sclater-Booth. Chamberlain raised the funds for the programme, contributing £10,000 himself. However, the Improvement Committee concluded that it would be too expensive to transfer slum-dwellers to municipally-built accommodation and so the land was leased as a business proposition on a 75 year lease. Slum dwellers were eventually rehoused in the suburbs and the scheme cost local government £300,000. The death-rate in Corporation Street decreased dramatically – from approximately 53 per 1,000 between 1873 and 1875 to 21 per 1,000 between 1879 and 1881.

During Chamberlain's tenure of office public and private money was used to construct libraries, municipal swimming pools and schools. The Birmingham Museum & Art Gallery was enlarged and a number of new parks were opened. Construction of the Council House was begun while the Victoria Law Courts were built on Corporation Street.

The mayoralty helped make Chamberlain a national as well as local figure, with contemporaries commenting upon his youthfulness and dress, including 'a black velvet coat, jaunty eyeglass in eye, red neck-tie drawn through a ring'. His contribution to the city's improvement earned Chamberlain the allegiance of the so-called 'Birmingham caucus' for the rest of his public career.