People Australia

Stephen Barker, by Allan Studio, c.1900

National Library of Australia, 22922413

Stephen Barker (1845-1924) tailor, trade union official and Australian Senator

Birth: 9 March 1845 at Swan Yard, Shoreditch, Middlesex, London, England, son of Stephen Barker (b.1811), porter, later sawyer, born at Saffron Walden, Essex, and Hannah, née Nagle (1816-1893), born at Cork, Ireland. His parents signed his birth registration with marks. Marriage: 6 April 1874 at St John’s Anglican Church, Latrobe Street, Melbourne, to Jane Laughton (1853-1914), a servant, born at Manchester, Lancashire, England. They had three daughters and three sons. Death: 21 June 1924, at Grange Road, Toorak, Melbourne; usual residence Hotham Street, East St Kilda, Melbourne. Religion: Protestant. 

• Barker was educated to primary school level. Having reached Australia probably about 1856, he was employed as a warehouseman in 1874. From about 1879 to 1886 he and his wife Jane lived in New Zealand, where four of their children were born. He worked as a presser in New Zealand and Victorian and clothing factories for many years.
• Barker was a foundation member of the Victorian Pressers' Society. He was also organiser of the Tramways Union and Musicians' Union. In 1891 he was a tailor carrying on business in Curzon Street, Melbourne. He was commissioned justice of the peace in January 1893. In 1895 he was described as a “tailor and dyer” prominent in connection with the Liberal Party and an associate of Dr Maloney.
• He spoke at Victorian Socialist League rallies about 1900.
• Secretary of the Political Labor Council, he was then secretary of Melbourne Trades Hall Council from 1901 to 1910.
• He was a councillor on North Melbourne Council and mayor in 1905.
• Barker contested Senate elections for the Australian Labor Party in Victoria in the early 1900s.
• Elected Labor member of the Australian Senate in 1910, he was defeated in 1919 and was re-elected to the Senate in 1922. He died in office.
• Cause of death: carcinoma of bowel (months) and cachexia, Toxaemia (gradual). 

Sources
Joan Rydon (ed), A biographical register of the Commonwealth Parliament 1901-1972 (ANU Press, 1975); Verity Burgmann, In Our Time: Socialism and the Rise of Labor, 1885-1905, (Sydney, 1985); Australian Worker 19 April 1906; Ann-Marie Gaudry, Stephen Barker, in Biographical Dictionary of the Australian Senate: https://biography.senate.gov.au/stephen-barker/.